"You can hear it all inside you, in the memory of all you've heard over a lifetime… Because all that you will ever hear are the voices of the past that echo in the jungle in the middle of the night." Amazonian Poet César Calvo (From an interview with Matteo Norzi)
A graceful and magical account of ayahuasca, the grandmother medicine that heals between waking and dreaming, blending the real and the unreal.
Angelina is here to heal her cancer, while actor Leonardo needs help with his stutter. Another young man is seeking to cure his drug addiction. People come here to heal, physically and spiritually. Deep in the Peruvian Amazon, the ancient psychedelic plant known as ayahuasca, and the ayahuasceros' icaros ** the songs Shamans learned from the forests ** guide the seekers. Arturo, the young shaman, tells Angelina that she's beset by 'susto', meaning that her soul left her body out of fear, rendering her tired and restless. Filmed in a genuine ayahuasca retreat, Icaros: A Vision meditatively – and sometimes with exquisite, trance-like animation – portrays these psychonauts' journey to liberation from fear, into love. It also reveals the little-known world of the ancient wisdom of Shamanism, which experiences the sadness and hope of the world we live in as a whole, and feels a deep need to heal.
2016 TRIBECA, WARSAW
Leonor Caraballo worked as a photographer and a video artist in Buenos Aires and New York simultaneously. She won important fellowships and grants. Her experimental videos have been shown internationally. Icaros: A Vision (2016) is her first feature film. Leonor died on January 24th, 2015 before completing the film. Matteo Norzi is a visual artist, from Uruguay and Italy, who lives in NYC. His exploratory artistic practice has taken him on extensive journeys across six continents. His art has been supported by important institutions. Icaros: A Vision (2016) is his debut feature film as a writer and director.
