Chronovisor Review (IFFR 2026)
Imagine if the Vatican had in its possession a device able to detect residual electromagnetic radiation and reconstruct images and sounds from the past on a screen. Now imagine this story being true, and you discover it all, including the dread of the potential ramifications and the thrill of encountering them.
Such is the experience of watching Chronovisor, named after the allegedly scientific machine developed by Father Pellegrino Ernetti in the 1960s. Ernetti was a multidisciplinary Catholic scholar with a sensitivity for music and physics, but also a popular Venetian exorcist. A Benedictine monk, he gained popularity in the 1980s for revealing the promise of his time machine and its application, before silently withdrawing and eventually disappearing when seemingly accused of fraud and (as stated, at least) being blackmailed by governmental figures.
This story is an oven-ready screenplay. The ingenious filmmaking collective, Cosmic Salon, turned it into a fascinating journey into the enthralling, spiralling, bottomless pit that academic investigation can become; an alluring and maddening capsule in which one can thrash around endlessly. Chronovisor follows the fictional character of Beatrice, a scholar who in 2025 becomes intrigued by the story of Father Ernetti and his parascientific claims. Through visits to the library, archival videotapes, and phone calls, Beatrice soon finds herself entangled with the past, and with Ernetti’s fabrication and the legacy it left among his peers.
Beatrice steps into her exploration with controlled stimulation and virtuosity (true to a researcher’s spirit), and, unaware of our persistent gaze, she leads us into a confined (yet so expansive) thought experiment that feels as real as dreamy. This lulling atmospheric effect comes mostly from the laconic, well-measured words, and a script largely executed through the music score (a respectful repurposing of Gustav Holst’s material), which renders the full range of hues and undertones this story can deliver. The 99-minute runtime of Chronovisor could easily be experienced as genre-fluid, one that would fit as well if it were an investigative music album (if only such a thing existed).
In a way, Chronovisor is a filmmaking stretch that lacks no grounds to be enjoyed in the cinema. It had me genuinely engaged in my seat, if not for its well-orchestrated story and the encompassing charm of its narrative arc, then certainly for its consistent 1980s aesthetics and grain (it’s shot in 16mm film). Bear with my leanings, as the mysterious aura claimed by cinema of that period is very much my soft spot; yet this imagery never feels derivative or trivial, but rather authentic and deliberate in its capacity to embed both viewer and character within the time of her research subject.
Jack Auen and Kevin Walker (aka the Cosmic Salon) entrust the original story of chronovisor with a great deal of creative flexibility, while challenging, at the same time, the threshold between subject, character, and viewer. Their choices, eloquent, evince not only a transmissible conviction in their story (I bet, you can tell), but also an invigorating approach to capturing and communicating archival research. By extension, they suggest that history, once researched, can be storified through the act of telling. Is this, perhaps, a novel set of audiovisual registers for academia? Or have they just now opened new potential avenues for filmmaking?
★★★★★
Chronovisor, 99’ / Dir./ Screenplay: Kevin Walker, Jack Auen / Cinematography: Leo Zhang / Editing: Kevin Walker, Jack Auen / Sound design: Eric Zhang / Production: Cosmic Salon Films / USA
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