In a distant past, Léon and Elvira, itinerant artists, make a living hopping from town to town. In Covarronca, harassed by the Commissioner, they are forced to spend the night out in the open. That’s when they meet Stubbs, a Cambridge student, with whom they find shelter in the home of a painter at odds with his wife. Meanwhile, a curse sends them into the 21st century, where the future of social security and of a rock band are at stake.
Some look at the night and see stars; others see far more than that. Here is one of the most improbable delights, in the box of surprises that is Providence and the Guitar, the fourth feature by João Nicolau, very freely adapted from the eponymous 1978 story by Robert Louis Stevenson. The adventures and misadventures of Léon and Elvira, a pair of itinerant troubadours in the 19th century, form the backbone of this period comedy built around the small frictions that a life devoted to art inevitably brings. In parallel, the film is intermittently traversed by another present: Léon plays in a punk rock band called Desgraça, while Elvira is a militant of the Total Left. Separated by time yet aligned in condition, they confront variations of the same dilemmas. Then as now, artistic life emerges as a fundamental practice, marked by persistence and stripped of mystification. More than a calling, it is a form of political resistance, a gesture that endures even when faced with structures of power, whether in a medieval or contemporary setting. At the centre of it all, word and song operate as engines of enchantment. This playful dimension, so characteristic of Nicolau’s cinema, achieves here a particular precision, unfolding in a picaresque humour expressed through rhythm, body and performance. The multidisciplinary filmmaker also co-writes the songs, in collaboration with João Lobo, who oversees the musical direction. These are songs that seem to demand a life beyond the film, perhaps even an album release, for the delight of all. “Go and spread the word. To those who are worth it and those in need.” (Susana Santos Rodrigues)
