On the evening of March 2, 1994, a Guardia di Finanza helicopter departing from the Cagliari Elmas base vanished into thin air during a patrol mission along the southeastern coast of Sardinia. On board were a veteran airman, Marshal Gianfranco Deriu, and young officer Fabrizio Sedda. Two days after the search began, some fragments of the aircraft are fished out. Then nothing more. The wreckage is missing. The bodies are missing. Can a military helicopter disappear during a routine flight without launching an SOS? Family members immediately doubt what the military says. They go hunting for evidence. They find witnesses who saw the helicopter flying in an area other than the one being searched, then a glow, a big roar, and silence. Fox 132 was shot down.

Some witnesses as early as a few hours after the incident tell investigators what they saw, but they are ignored, and a month after the incident the military investigation closes by declaring that it was an accident and the two (missing) pilots are charged with culpable loss of the aircraft. For family members, the official truth is not enough. Too many omissions, inconsistencies, silences. And the presence of a ship that many witnesses saw that night and whose existence the military denies.

After more than 30 years, the still-open investigation into the disappearance of Fox 132 has been unable or unwilling to explain the cause of the disaster. Yet the prosecutor’s office is officially investigating the hypothesis of the shooting down after analyzing the few wreckage of the helicopter.

“The Wheat and the Fox” through the family members’ lawyer, the families themselves, the journalists who for years have sought the truth, as well as some military personnel who were present during those tragic events, recounts a more than 20-year-long yearning for truth, despite inertia and possible red herrings.

Between inquiry and fable

In the documentary by Raffaele Manco and Vincenzo Guerrizio, assisted by Francesco Deplano, there is an account of an investigation that is a contribution to the search for truth. A reflection on the search for truth. A three-year-long work for which the authors have studied and verified on hundreds of documents, through hours of discussions with lawyers and prosecutors, always in collaboration with experts in the field so as not to incur any errors and not to advance improbable or conspiratorial hypotheses.

The use of dynamic maps guides the viewer in understanding places, times and routes. All in the beautiful landscapes of Sardinia. And it is precisely on the beauty of the island that the film’s photographic work is based. The intense blue of the sea on the east coast, the bright green of the vegetation, and the hard, severe morphology of the rocks provide a counterpoint to the tragedy. What is familiar to us suddenly becomes disturbing, uncanny. Form becomes content and one wonders how such beauty can conceal so much pain.

The soundtrack created by Baska, a trio of exceptional Sardinian musicians, takes the sounds of tradition while contaminating them with other musical styles. The music is itself storytelling. Add to that the musical contribution of composer Antonio Scofano, who created some songs in a more purely cinematic style.

The female narrator’s voice was chosen because it better matched the fairytale-like suggestions given by the landscapes. The quiet, gentle tone of the voice creates even greater emphasis in the beauty/tragedy relationship and better aids the viewer in understanding where the narrative becomes more intricate.

The exclusive documentary

There is an exclusive interview with the only eyewitness to the incident (now deceased) and there are the original radio communications of that evening where the voices of the pilots and the control tower can be heard. This, too, is the result of a very long search between permits and technical impediments because to listen to the tapes again required special instrumentation that is now unobtainable and in disuse.

Family members continue in their efforts to ensure that the curtain does not fall on this affair that has yet to find justice. They have written many letters to men in the Italian government and not least to Italian President Sergio Mattarella. In 2016 Laoudice Deriu, wife of one of the two pilots, was received in a group audience by Pope Francis and read a letter about the incident.

The documentary has never found any form of television or film distribution, but it has been screened on numerous occasions in various Italian cities to keep the memory of Gianfranco Deriu and Fabrizio Sedda alive.