Blinded in a fire at the age of 12, Blanca Ferrando (Maria Chiara Giannetta) has adapted to her lack of vision but nonetheless, her colleagues in the Genoese police station of San Teodoro remain sceptical or – worse – jealous of her analytical powers, which often trump their own. They lack her perceptive acuity and her determination.
A consultant, employed to decode audio recordings for clues, Blanca’s heightened perception of sound, feel and smell enable her to detect nuances and patterns that are indistinguishable to most people. Her abilities have made her invaluable in solving complex police cases.
Blanca has a very personal, tragic incentive to apply her wits to solving crime. She is propelled by the trauma of losing her eyesight in a fire set by her sister Beatrice’s boyfriend, a vengeful attack that ultimately killed Beatrice. Her past drives Blanca to unearth truths that prevent other needless deaths, or provide solace to the families of the dead. This series is not a bleak one though, aided by a juicy funk soundtrack and the opportunities arising from her friendships with chef Nanni (Pierpaolo Spollon), and her colleague Inspector Michele Liguori (Giuseppe Zeno, also seen in La sonata del silencio).
Maria Chiara Giannetta as Blanca Ferrando and guide dog Linnaeus in ‘Blanca’. Source: Lux Vide
And then there’s one of the most compelling relationships in Blanca: her adoration for her guide dog Linnaeus.
Foggia-born Maria Chiara Giannetta may be familiar to some viewers as Anna Olivieri in the long-running Italian crime series Don Matteo, which she joined in 2014. She also starred in two films released in 2018: Mollami and Tafanos. Since childhood, Giannetta has been immersed in theatre and the very physical act of gesture, expression and attuning to the highly emotive responsiveness of an actor to an audience.
Blanca and Linnaeus with Inspector Michele Liguori (Giuseppe Zeno). Source: Lux Vide
On screen, this physicality and awareness are trained into Blanca’s hypersensitivity to sound and touch, and this series is touted as the first production (on a global scale) to use , which is a customised 3D sound-recording technique that mimics the spatial and intense, all-encompassing experience of sound.
Although Giannetta is not blind, there has been a strong effort from the producers and cast to ensure that this series is a truthful evocation of both the novel Blanca by Naples-born and based crime writer Patrizia Rinaldi, and of the experience of blindness.
Providing , and in the subtleties of living in the world without vision, was none other than the great Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli. As he explained to Giannetta and the producers, he developed a fierce passion for discovering challenges as a blind child: how to master the art of riding a bike, then horse riding; skills and experiences which other children may have taken for granted (or been too lazy to attempt at all).
Nanni (Pierpaolo Spollon) with Blanca (Maria Chiara Giannetta). Source: Lux Vide
Bocelli conveyed, most importantly, that he had never considered his blindness an obstacle, but a reality in which he could live more fully and sensuously within. Giannetta spent considerable time with the opera great, watching and listening with a willingness to learn so that her portrayal of Blanca would be respectful, honest and truthful.
The stellar team are largely to credit for the relatability and perfectly paced storytelling, including director Jan Maria Michelini (Devils, Medici) and writers Francesco Arlanch (DOC), Mario Ruggeri (Devils), Luisa Cotta Ramosino (Made in Italy) and Lea Tafuri (Don Matteo).
Maria Chiara Giannetta in ‘Blanca’. Source: Lux Vide
An Italian drama inevitably opens up an aesthetic wonderland, which – along with the intensive and naturalistic sound experience – make Blanca feel immediate and enthralling. Contrasted with the bleakness of the industrial Italian port (in the northern part of the Ligurian Sea) is the dreamy antique fishing village of Boccadasse, speckled with pastel-hued bayside houses, the seaside village of Camigli and the medieval centre of Genoa.
Blanca’s first case is that of Margherita, a woman Blanca had a passing acquaintance with at the police station. When Margherita is found stabbed under the San Giorgio Bridge, Blanca determinedly provides assistance to Liguori, despite not being directly assigned to the case. They form a bond, which proves successful again in investigating teenager Camillo’s death.
As more gruesome deaths occur, and Blanca’s expertise is desperately relied upon, a web of envy, deceit, international trafficking of artefacts, gangs and debts grows broader and fuller around her. She is both the heroine and the victim, with those closest to her seemingly posing the most danger.
Giuseppe Zeno in ‘Blanca’. Source: Lux Vide
Giannetta revealed in that playing Blanca awoke in her a deeper curiosity for life. “When you are missing an instrument, in reality, you can draw on another hundred thousand, which can somehow compensate, but have different and efficient functions in the same way,” she said.
In Blanca Ferrando, Gianetta gives us an investigator who draws on her intense curiosity and innate need for justice, opening a world of sensory clues beyond vision.
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