Based on the recording of 15 spectacular equestrian shows from the unique Zingaro Theater company over three decades, Time of the Untamed is an inner journey through times and cultures, an introspection on the passing of time and the relation to others and to the world, a mesmeric and fascinating round through the creative mind of Bartabas

The equestrian theater “Zingaro” is without any doubt one of the most striking theatrical adventures in the contemporary theater world.
Author-actor-director of this human and animal comedy, I wanted to travel through images to the depth of this quest that is both an equestrian and spiritual achievement.
For this, I set up an extraordinary cinematographic project; the shooting, which started more than thirty years ago, allowed me to collect all kind of stolen images from the viewers’ memories. They were the witnesses of this incredible artistic adventure.
But, collecting is not enough, one has to make sense of it. Making History from my personal one, exploring the time travelling on the stage, until we get to what bounds me to the animal.
A film structured like a Bildungsroman that questions the relationship between reality and imagination.
Trying to tell through images the ephemeral magic of theater, the spectacular emotion and intimacy that it creates in you. Use the poet’s words to tell what life is about.
An outstanding quest.

BARTABAS

* Available on DVD ici *

For a long time thought of as an equestrian utopia, the Galop arrière (« Backward canter ») requires for the horse and its rider to have an incredible bond and mastery, as well as the exceptional ability to move backwards while facing forward. It was thus natural for Bartabas, in order to evoke his whole journey and that of the Théâtre Zingaro, to choose this stately title, with a peculiar perspective; a way of going back in time without retracing his steps. Even though this project is indeed about exploring and bringing twenty five years of artistic adventures back to life, it is not a nostalgic recollection.

It is an original and accomplished film which is offered to us. The furious ardour of the Cabarets, the challenges of the Opéra, the magic of Chimère, the pure beauty of Eclipse, the painful celebration of Triptyk, the active meditation of Loungta, the iconic bolting of Battuta, everything is there, and yet another secret, intimate, glimpsed story is written, using the words of the poets to tell the meaning of an unusual, risky, unyielding, inspired life.

A life, once and for all, in the shape of a cavalier fate.

Escaped from the Gulag on yakut horses, Dimitri, a former violinist from Moscow, and an old Shaman run away in the taiga. Before dying, the Shaman reveals to his companion that the spirits surround him, and that they will accompany him in his adventures and his encounters, through this vastness where no man can survive alone.

Dimitri escapes for ever on his small yakut horse and will never fit again in the mold of the silent men who walk in line in the streets of Irkutsk.

* Available on VOD and on DVD *

Cannes’ Official Selection 1993 (In Competition)

Technical Grand Prize – Cannes International Film Festival, 1993

Mazeppa is the story of a passion. The exclusive passion which binds two men to horses. The first one exhausts himself trying to paint moving horses: this is Théodore Géricault, a famous 19th-century artist. The other one takes pride in dominating them completely: this is Franconi, the squire leading a wandering troupe of horsemen and who is called “master”. What unites these two men is the will of the master to teach Géricault what a horse really is, and Géricault’s thirst for knowledge. A film as beautiful as a firework, celebrating the sacred union of men and horses.

* Available on VOD and on DVD *