SYNOPSIS

Finding Thule is a feature length documentary that tells the story of Italian engineer-turned-explorer Giancarlo Gianazza, who during the course of several years sets out to a remote region of central Iceland on a quest to find the Holy Grail. According to his theories, mainly derived from clues he finds hidden inside the paintings of Leonardo Da Vinci, Botticelli and Raphael, the whereabouts of the treasure would be encoded in the numerical structure of the epic poem The Divine Comedy, written by Dante Alighieri between 1308 and his death in 1321.

It is in Botticelli’s Primavera that Gianazza finds a striking similarity with the last 6 songs (canti) of Dante’s Purgatorio - the second book of the trilogy dealing with Dante’s imaginary ascent to paradise, passing through Hell and Purgatory. Gianazza takes this journey literally becoming convinced that Dante is giving the geographical coordinates of a precise location in Iceland where he travels every year since 2004 hoping to unearth a mysterious treasure: the lost treasure of the Knights Templar.

In 2014, young filmmaker Sofia E. Rovati joins Gianazza and his team with the intention of documenting the archaeological endeavour. Throughout the years the project becomes a larger-than-life adventure into which the filmmaker is inevitably drawn. Stepping in front of the camera, Sofia starts noticing and tracing parallels between her personal journey and the autobiographical journey of Dante. The lines between reality and fiction start to blur as the characters of the Divine Comedy come alive and this real-life treasure hunt in Iceland’s ethereal landscape turns into a discovery of what lies within.

Sofia E. Rovati, Director

is a Milanese filmmaker, who specializes in documentary films. She lived and studied in London where she graduated
with a degree in History of Art at Goldsmiths University in 2013, with a thesis on the relationship between Cinema and Architecture. Her filmmaking career began on the movie set of the film Antonia (2015), directed by Italian director Ferdinando Cito Filomarino and produced by Award-winning director and producer Luca Guadagnino, director of I am Love (2009), A Bigger Splash (2015), Call me By Your Name (2017). On set Guadagnino noticed her and offered her to become his PA in his Milan-based film production company Frenesy Film. Sofia spent one year (2013-2014) working closely with Mr. Guadagnino, acquiring a diverse range of skills and learning from truly unique experiences, from TV commercials with great actors such as Tilda Swinton and Matthew Goode, to the pre-production of Oscar-nominated film Call me By Your Name, written by James Ivory, as well as the screen-writing of the film Suspiria (2018). She also sided Mr. Guadagnino in his role as juror in the Festa del Cinema di Roma in 2014. In 2015, Sofia returns to London where she completes an MA degree at MET Film School. That year she starts planning the making of her very first independent film, a feature-length documentary called FINDING THULE, for which she successfully raised £25.000 from an online crowdfunding campaign to kick-start the project. FINDING THULE is a story within a story, which starts from a group of researchers looking for a treasure hidden in Iceland and ends up telling the journey of a young girl, who after long wandering finally finds her voice and the wings to fly, discovering much more than just a golden cup.