by Juliane Biasi
Italia, 2016, 52'
Indyca (Torino)
Giorgia is a lively teenager who lives in a village close to the
river Adige, in the heart of the Alps. The landscape around is
dotted with vineyards which change colour along the
seasons, from tender green to green to yellow and orange
and red. But Giorgia doesn't perceive this scenery at all, as
she is completely blind, blind born. Giorgia lives protected
by her family and fellows but her wish is not to be assisted
and nursed, her main wish is to find a place and an active
role for her in the society, where she could be esteemed and
loved by other people and by the world outside. During an
experience of blind orienteering Giorgia met Giona, who
became her best friend. Giona arrived to Italy from Albany
when she was a baby and together with her family moved to
Riva del Garda, a nice town close to one of the biggest
european lakes. Giona became blind when she was three,
and if she switches her coclear implant off she is also deaf.
She can vaguely remember what she saw as a little child,
when she managed to see, but towards her missed sight she has a kind of permanent homesickness. Giorgia wants to help Giona to completely accept her condition of being a blind girl, like Giorgia does, as a condition of human richness and worth of being explored with enthusiasm. A first step to explore together the world around, as blind but autonomous girls, is a small/great project they decided to carry out: to reach by themselves and without any support nor guide an ice cream parlour located along the lake, where local teenagers meet.
I remember when I was a child I was scared by the darkness, and growing up I was forced to remove this fear. When I met Giorgia I was posed once again in front of the ancestral fear of the darkness, of the monsters which can hide in the darkness, which I identify with the fear, sometimes irrational, of other people. I think I can become afraid not to see, not to see correctly, not to hear, not to understand, but Giorgia for me is a kind of symbol, a key to get inside the hidden world, a world I don't know, it's a mirror where my need to go beyond the fear is reflected; my need to accept the fear as something nourishing which allows me to grow up and evolve. I understand that the sight is not the most important sense and there are so many things more
important than it.
With Giorgia I discover that a totally dark world doesn't exist at all, even for her who is blind born. Giorgia and Giona love
their own very special and difficult world, they are able to
make it bright and full of strength, and they would like to
show it to everybody. They would like all the people were
able to get over the anguish of the lack of the sight, the
anguish dealing with the primary fear of the darkness, in
order to see that the lack of a sense increases the sensitivity of the other senses. They'd also like to let us understand how sweet and nice it is to face the life together with a blind teenager, or deaf, or with any else disability.