Opera Synopsis

The Chronicles of Lot is an opera film that reimagines the biblical story through an alien lens. A clash between Judaic and pagan cultures evolves into an enduring struggle between individual freedom and state power. At its centre is Lot, torn between worldly utopianism and the uncompromising legal order imposed by alien rulers.

Director’s Statement

The genesis of this opera occurred more than fifteen years ago when I began imagining the story of Abraham and Lot as ordinary people rather than distant Biblical figures. Later, I introduced the idea that extraterrestrial beings had seeded and overseen humanity, creating a framework that further removed the narrative from its traditional religious setting while preserving its central conflicts.

As I was completing the score and experimenting with AI-generated vocals, an unexpected opportunity emerged: to create a film using AI-generated imagery. From the start, rather than conceal the visual inconsistencies inherent in early AI filmmaking, I chose to embrace them. The distortions, mutations and unstable imagery became an extension of the work’s themes: flawed creation, uncertain reality, and humanity’s uneasy relationship with its own perception of truth.

At its core, the opera explores the collision of competing worldviews. Many ideas, cultures and systems of belief are fundamentally incompatible, and no amount of persuasion, politics or slogans can fully reconcile them. That tension creates a sense of disorientation and disequilibrium that permeates the work. This film inhabits a space of uncertainty where competing visions of truth, order and freedom collide, leaving the audience to confront the same questions faced by its characters.