ELYSIAN FIELDS
Anna-Maria Dutoit / Germany, Greece / 2025 / 28 min / Colour
Tending to their ancient olive grove, threatened by fire and drought in the Greek mountains near Delphi, may feel for this father and son like the fate of Sisyphus, the king condemned by the gods to push a boulder up a hill only to see it roll back down each time he reaches the top. The olive-growing family lives in fear that the wildfires, carried by the wind and which recently devastated the region, may reach their grove. They also worry about the persistent lack of rainfall that is drying out the land. Yet their olive grove is as beautiful as the Elysian Fields, the paradise of ancient Greek myth. In this “paradise,” the two seek solutions and always manage to find the strength to begin again. Even the son, torn between staying to carry on the work passed down for generations and leaving for something new, seems rooted to the land by a deep bond that is hard to break.
Anna-Maria Dutoit
A Greek-Swiss director born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, she grew up in Munich, Germany, where she studied Political Science and Geography. Since 2019, she has been studying Documentary Filmmaking at the Hochschule für Fernsehen und Film in Munich. Her work includes Velhice (2023), I’tikaaf (2022), and Out of Sight, Out of Mind (2020), which won an award at the CinemAmbiente Film Festival in Turin.
