Nathalie Nambot

From the seascapes of the North African Mediterranean to the streetscapes of Paris, this personal 16mm essay film explores the idealism and hard realities of departure and arrival. Stories of the post-revolution Tunisian diaspora in France, who “burned the sea” to leave, only to discover a new form of confinement in their liberation, provide a powerful meditation on personal revolution and freedom, and the compromises that face those whose mobility is a double-edged sword.

There is no denying that autobiographical intentions and introspection have their pitfalls. But a man's voice off screen sets the tone from the start: "There is no such thing as a private diary. The very expression is nonsensical." No chance then to see outpourings, confessions or explanations.

An attempt to connect the past and present time through poems, stories, documents; connect the spaces from Kronstadt to Moscow with the voices of the past, the words of Osip and Nadezhda Mandelstam, A. Akhmatova.