Classical Period

What do some friends who are part of a reading group, attend to literary conferences and are into academic environments talk about? Books, obviously. But also of other disciplines. All this is possible because the lead characters of Ted Fendt’s second full-length film can talk about the architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright as well as they discuss about the first American translation of the Dante’s Divine Comedy. This translation is an unusual mid-nineteenth edition which seems to teleport us into another era only by mention it. An age outside any defined time frame, a world that is the Philadelphia of today; nevertheless, it is also an anachronism that has survived the vicissitudes of modern life by taking comfort in the pleasures of the arts. Yes, a classic period in the sense that it reaches the perfect balance between literary quotations and cinematographic form that sustains them, such as the framings and the muted colours (a peculiar aspect of Straub). A brief lesson of history. JAIME PENA