Elisa Fuksas's autobiographical film 'iSola' documents cancer and lockdown

Elisa Fuksas's autobiographical documentary 'iSola' premiered at the 77th Venice International Film Festival as part of the Giornate degli Autori section. Shot entirely on a smartphone, the film chronicles the director's experience of being in quarantine while awaiting surgery for thyroid cancer during the COVID-19 pandemic. Fuksas, who serves as both director and protagonist, uses the camera as a confidant to capture her solitude in her Rome home, her interactions with family and her dog, and her struggle with fear and faith. She converted to Catholicism in 2019, a year before her diagnosis, and the film explores how her religious belief provides a framework for coping with illness and uncertainty. Fuksas deliberately avoids vanity, filming herself in a disheveled state, and employs a technique of holding the phone at a distance to create the illusion of being filmed by someone else, allowing her to treat the footage as fiction during editing. The film reflects on the broader societal tendency to forget the pandemic, which Fuksas compares to the lasting impact of 9/11 on New York. The interview with Margherita Bordino accompanies the article.