Vera

For Vera Gemma, beauty is a highly serious matter. Daughter of the spaghetti western icon Giuliano Gemma, she feels crushed by the weight of her parentage and her inherited fame. With her timeless face and her assertive – to put it mildly – fashion sense, this charismatic woman wanders around Rome in search of experiences, emotions and encounters. A road accident that injures a child offers her the chance to turn a corner, befriending the boy's family to fill the void in her life. Drawing on the real-life character of Vera Gemma, directors Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel have made a quirky and profound film that thrives on the nebulous border between fiction and reality. Through the depiction of monotonous daily wandering, Vera tackles head-on the question of privilege, the society of the spectacle, the transactional nature of our relationships, and how our identities are constructed. Filled with contradictions, the heroine’s personality fascinates: unique and caricatural, offbeat and touching, egocentric and altruistic all at once. Vera Gemma's first role is an incredible performance, winning her the best actress award at the Venice Film Festival.

Bastien Bento