Summary

This visually and sensory-immersive road movie follows Baptiste, an autistic man and his filmmaker sister, Chloé, as they bike along the winding Danube River in search of their sibling bonds and freedom. The vast landscapes reflect their quest as they ride through ancient cities, silent forests, and mist-laden waters.

Along the way, they encounter a wise old fisherman who teaches them the patience of casting nets and observing nature, a neuroscientist who offers insights into the mind’s intricacies, and an enigmatic shaman who guides them in a ritual under the stars. Each encounter deepens their exploration into the world of autistic perception and challenges them to rethink humanity’s relationship with labour and identity.

Director’s note

The film was born from the need to approach the mystery I’ve grown up with : my brother.  I had to broaden my perspective to connect with my brother; otherwise, he would have remained a stranger. He invited me to move beyond myself. What’s true on an individual level is also valid on a collective scale. An autistic person disrupts conventions, norms, and codes. The relationship question becomes one of crossing boundaries—a passage you choose to take or not. This film is an invitation to that journey, so we set off towards the Danube, my brother’s great obsession.

Based on our journals, the film opens with a shared memory from our two perspectives in 2D rotoscope animation. It revisits this memory several times, adding new depth and piecing together the missing parts until it reveals a new image born of our dialogue—a truly shared archive.

This memory intertwines with the landscapes and the people we meet. My camera will capture these encounters, and then my brother will have the camera to film us on this adventure.

To evoke what it means to live with autistic perception, our journey along the Danube is punctuated by visual and auditory autistic escapes, where landscapes transform and sound sharpen. Forms alter under the effect of the 3D Gaussian Splatting technique, resonating with my brother’s murmurs and songs.

The use of animation in this documentary comes from my deep and long investigation of filming autistic perception since my formation in cinema and visual arts at the Fresnoy-National Studio of Contemporary Arts.