It's SIFF season, baby! Seattle's favorite film fest returns this month with 262 films over 11 days (April 14–24) screening both in-person and online. We're rounding up some of our favorites. Every day, expect two more recommendations on Slog.
US, 2022, 93 min, Dir. Sara Dosa
Honestly, what's more erotic—poetically, I mean—than a volcano? Pressure churning below the surface! An explosion into the atmosphere! Magma oozing out crevices in a bright orange river! The Earth spewing molten rock! It's pure, geological, horny DRAMA, baby!!!
Director Sara Dosa plays with the connection between volcanoes and love with her buzzy documentary Fire of Love, recently acquired by National Geographic Documentary Films for a mid-seven figures. Narrated by Miranda July, the film tells the love story of married French volcanologists Katia and Maurice Krafft and their shared passion for exploding rocks. Forgoing any traditional kind of marriage or family structure, the Kraffts made their home on the tops of active volcanoes, alarmingly close to all the spectacular geological action.
Fire of Love is composed purely of archival footage, most of which was shot by Katia and Maurice on their travels to sites like Mount Stromboli in Italy, Nyiragongo in Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Mount St. Helens in Washington. With their red caps and space age-lookin' heat suits, the Kraffts resemble characters in a Wes Anderson movie. Or perhaps the French New Wave is a better comparison—the couple's documentation of volcanoes often veered into the poetic and impressionistic, stitched together by Dosa to reflect not only the marvels of volcanoes but the power of love. But not in a cheesy way!
Playing at SIFF Egyptian on Friday, April 22 at 6:30 pm, at SIFF Uptown on Sunday, April 24 at 2:00 pm, and available to stream the entire length of the festival. Fire of Love is also competing in SIFF's Official Competition to win a cash prize of $5,000.
