Tag: Los Muertos

Essays

A Hole in the Heart of Man, Out At the Edge of the World: Some Remarks On the Cinema of Lisandro Alonso

Written by Jay Kuehner November 17, 2009June 9, 2020

[Published in conjunction with NWFF’s Hot Splice]

“Why is manhood… an endless highway?” – Adam Zagajewski, Tierra del Fuego

The NWFF is to be commended for presenting a rare coup: a cycle of films that taken together evince a dedicated and visionary artist at work, the Argentine director Lisandro Alonso. The devoted following that Alonso’s work to date has commanded owes mostly to the fact that his films are both rarefied in their aesthetic and scarcely screened to audiences beyond the festival circuit. In a career that is nascent yet already overwhelmingly singular in style, here is a director who is clearly hitting his stride. We are fortunate to have the opportunity of seeing Alonso’s four features, and it is truly anÂ honor to have the director in attendance.

When Alonso’s debut La Libertad premiered in 2001, seeming to come out of nowhere save for its own rural milieu, it was a bit of an enigma to cinephiles. Was the story, much of it unfolding in real time in an unnamed outback in the Pampas, involving the quotidien labor of a woodcutter named Misael, a piece of documentary or fiction? Was Misael playing himself? Did such labor exist? And crucially, was this for real? And who the fuck did the director think he was, offering very little in the way of narrative save for the swinging of an ax, the buying of cigarettes, a ride in a pick-up truck with dog and timber, and the ritual slaying of an armadillo for dinner?

Essays

Lisandro Alonso: Space, Time, Cinema

Written by Sean Axmaker November 12, 2009June 9, 2020

It’s surely dawned on Seattle cineastes that program director of Northwest Film Forum, Adam Sekular, has an affection for films that are minimalist portraits in time. Think back to the retrospectives of Pedro Costa and Albert Serra, as well as numerous defiantly non-commercial films on calendars past that are uniquely individual, resolutely observational and more concerned with the texture of scenes (from the ambiguous and guarded emotions of impassive performers to the way time passes on screen) than the narrative movement of story.

I’d say that’s a good description of the cinema of Lisandro Alonso, whose four features are showcased in Northwest Film Forum’s series “At the Edge Of The World: The Cinema of Lisandro Alonso” (November 11-20). I wrote an essay on Alonso and his films for The Stranger, but wasn’t able to get in everything that I was thinking about, so consider this a companion piece.

Alonso keeps company with Lucretia Martel (whose The Headless Woman just finished a run at NWFF) as the most exciting filmmakers to have come out of Argentina (is it the New Argentine Cinema or the New New Argentine Cinema?). Both are immersive directors with cameras that observe their subjects intently with little exposition and no commentary. Critics talk of cameras as microscopes. These directors are more like naturalists shooting fictional documentaries of subjects in their environments, but where Martel explores the thickets of messy lives at their most tangled and murky, Alonso prefers isolated subjects and lonely landscapes. And by isolated, I mean from other people. These are not men (and Alonso’s protagonists are all men) who explain themselves. They are content in their silence as they sip mate or swig vodka from a bottle.

It’s about space, with and without people, and the passing of time, both subjective and objective. In La Libertad, his debut film, the spaces are all outside, in the forest, on roads, and the changing of the light from morning to afternoon to dark of night is an essential element of the environment; in one shot, we see the late afternoon light dim until it turns dusk while he does his evening chores before settling down for dinner, his day literally keyed to the rhythm of the turning of the Earth. In Fantasma, those spaces are interior, from the emptiness of a vast modern theater lobby (it looks more like the foyer of a modern office tower designed not just to impress but to intimidate) to the emptiness of a theater auditorium where, at most, three people arrive to watch the movie. (I love how they all gravitate to clump within a couple of seats of each other, as if drawn to comfort of society, but never actually interact or even acknowledge on another.)

Essays, Interviews

Lisandro Alonso in Seattle and At the Edge of the World

Written by Editor November 12, 2009June 9, 2020

The films of Lisandro Alonso, one of the most exciting and accomplished directors working to redefine filmmaking on the international stage, are showcased in Northwest Film Forum’s series “At the Edge Of The World: The Cinema of Lisandro Alonso” (November 11-20). The young filmmaker (in his early thirties) has made four features since his debut, La Libertad, in 2001. Only one of his films has been released on DVD in the U.S. (Los Muertos on Facets DVD) and all are making their respective Seattle screen debuts in this series. They are all well worth your time to see, especially on the screen. Alonso’s films are experiences, as much about the passing of time and the texture of his landscapes and the light upon his subjects (he shoots his films with available light, which has a particular way of sculpting his images) as the enigmatic characters and their journeys through their respective worlds.

Here’s a set of links to features, interviews and reviews on the filmmaker and his films, beginning with some pieces by Parallax View contributors and friends:

A Hole in the Heart of Man, Out At the Edge of the World: Some Remarks On the Cinema of Lisandro Alonso – Jay Kuehner (Parallax View)
Kathleen Murphy on Liverpool at TIFF 2008 (MSN)
Robert Horton’s review of Liverpool (Everett Herald)
Into the Wild: Sean Axmaker on Lisandro Alonso (The Stranger)
“Lisandro Alonso: Time, Space, Cinema” — Sean Axmaker (Parallax View)
“Making of Liverpool” videos (Hot Splice)