Punta Sacra screens virtually nationwide from 5/31 to 6/5.

Francesca Mazzoleni’s lyrical documentary traces a multifaceted portrait of Ostia, a small village at the mouth of the Tiber, south of Rome. The site where Pier Paolo Pasolini’s body was discovered following his murder, Ostia is now something of a down-home assemblage of illegally built houses for the organically grown local culture of the roughly 500 families living there. But as with so many vestiges of a time before our globalized present, Ostia’s existence is threatened by encroaching real estate development, suggesting its time may be more limited than its residents had hoped. Mazzoleni embeds with the locals and spends time with them, particularly Ostia’s women, initiating intimate conversations and ultimately arriving at an absorbing ode to their courage, strength, and perseverance.