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Behind-the-scenes stories from the film about Allan Kardec that premiered in theaters in May 2019.
In 2019, on the occasion of Allan Kardec's 150th birthday, screenwriter and director Wagner de Assis teamed up with journalist and screenwriter Marcel Souto Maior to adapt the biography of one of Spiritism's greatest icons for the screen. Produced by Conspiração and distributed by Sony Pictures, the feature film "Kardec: The Movie" tells the story of Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail. In the book "Kardec: The Story Behind the Movie ," readers are invited to take a behind-the-scenes look at the filming process.
At 53, the skeptical professor, a member of the Paris Academy of Sciences, decided to change his life and name to give voice to spirits and reveal the hidden depths of the invisible world. For his work, he became known as the codifier and foremost promoter of the Spiritist doctrine. But what made Professor Rivail become Allan Kardec? What led him to believe in the presence and influence of spirits? What adversaries did he face to spread the doctrine proclaimed in The Spirits' Book ? The answers were brought to the big screen, in a time travel to 19th-century France, portraying a life of struggle and transformation.
By the candlelight and street lamps of a Paris in turmoil—an atmosphere accurately reproduced in the historical biopic "Kardec "—director Wagner de Assis and his crew experienced surprising, moving, and also amusing episodes. These events are recounted in the first part of "Kardec: The Story Behind the Film ," in chronicles written during the day-to-day filming, still under the impact of unexpected circumstances.
The book also features previously unpublished texts by journalist Marcel Souto Maior—author of the biography that inspired the film—about the process of gradually uncovering this historical figure. Finally, in the previously unpublished interview in the third part of the book, Marcel Souto Maior and Wagner de Assis discuss their approach to issues such as spirituality, writing, and film.
Enriched with photographic records of the experiences and emotions experienced on set, Kardec: The Story Behind the Film records the challenge of reconstructing and bringing to the big screen the trajectory of one of the fathers of Spiritism.
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