BBFF2026 Song of Breath

Across Italy, Mongolia and Australia, SONG OF BREATH follows three encounters with sound and the elemental force that gives rise to it: breath.

Deep in the Paneveggio forest in the Italian Dolomites, a red spruce holds within its timber the possibility of music. In Mongolia, a young boy searches for the primal vibration of his own voice. In Australia, the resonant pulse of the didgeridoo carries sound through body, land and culture.

Director Simona Canonica draws these seemingly distant worlds together through a film in which listening becomes as important as looking. Song, vibration, breath and silence shape the journey, revealing sound not simply as something we hear, but as something physical - carried through wood, landscape and the human body.

Moving between the intimate and the elemental, SONG OF BREATH traces the moment breath becomes voice, voice becomes music, and sound becomes a way of connecting across cultures and generations.

A rare and deeply meditative work of cinema, SONG OF BREATH asks us to listen differently - and reminds us that before there was image, there was sound.

This session features a special sound ceremony from Glenn Barry - a Gamilaraay man who utilises the sound vibrations of the Yidaki (Didgeridoo) to bring gii/dhuwi (heart and soul) into the world of feeling.

English, Italian, Mongolian and Yolŋu Matha with English subtitles