Description
In Charleville-Mézières, a small town in the Northeast of France, visitors find Arthur Rimbaud’s grave, or rather his last home. Indeed, much more than a place of remembrance, it has become a real living space. The fans of the famous French poet come from the four corners of the world to honor his memory, each in its own way: having a joyful drink, reciting deliriously his verse, delivering a personal present or a attaching to the iron grid a private message. Some go as far as touching the stone, caressing the iron cross or hiding behind the back of the tomb. Unexpected situations, moving moments, unusual visitors Quite as some of the characters with a singular profile that the director of the film suggests we meet in this little municipality of the Ardennes. In doing so, he turns the small city from the place of birth of an illustrious contributor to French literature into a theater where everyone can imagine the set, as well as the role which he wants to play. Another way of bringing poetry to life. And the viewer to discover the empowering strength of rhyme as an ally in the struggles of daily life. Thus, we shall meet an amateur archaeologist who deciphers the fossils he found in the woods of his region: for him, the poetry of Rimbaud is sourced there and he wants the authorities to take his discoveries seriously and create a museum. Or the homeless intellectual who carries a bookcase on his back, lives with Dante and speaks as others write. There is also the proud postman, not quite as others, who delivered during his entire career his mail to Rimbaud. And there are even other characters who make chocolate candies to his effigy, and therewith give its name to this documentary. As to the two guards of the cemetery, they are much more than cleaners of a grave among others. They are privileged witnesses the thousands of tributes brought from across the world and gathered over the years as small treasures. Conscientiously, but with simplicity, they take care of this almost living memory, and share with us some fragments of it. So, with a poet’s grave as starting point, the film offers us a reality full of strength and life, love and poetry and thus restores the dignity, originality and beauty of a region otherwise struck by economic disaster and decline.
