Over the past decade, Verena Paravel & Lucien Castaing-Taylor have made some of the most mesmerizing documentary films through Harvard University‘s Sensory Ethnography Lab. Count 2012’s “Leviathan” and 2017’s “Caniba” among the duo’s best works–two films that explore the viscerality of human life in distinctly different ways.
Now the pair return with their latest film, “De Humani Corporis Fabrica,” fresh off its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival last year. Paraval and Castaing-Taylor’s new film gets its title from a 16th-century book series about studying human anatomy. Likewise, the doc explores the human body through footage of surgeries and autopsies in hospitals around Paris. So, another film from these two that’s not for the faint of heart, but also made from the heart.
Here’s an official synopsis for “De Humani Corporis Fabrica”:
Five centuries ago, anatomist André Vésale opened up the human body to science for the first time in history. Today, DE HUMANI CORPORIS FABRICA opens the human body to the cinema. It reveals that human flesh is an extraordinary landscape that exists only through the gaze and attention of others. As places of care, suffering and hope, hospitals are laboratories that connect every body in the world.
Along with its world premiere on the Croisette last year, “De Humani Corporis Fabrica” also had screenings at TIFF and the New York Film Festival last Fall. Read The Playlist’s review from Cannes of the doc here.
Ready for another uncanny look at humanity from Verena Paravel & Lucien Castaing-Taylor? Well, “De Humani Corporis Fabrica” hits IFC Center in NYC On April 14, followed by an LA opening at Laemmle Glendale on April 18. Check out a trailer for the film below.
