Third screening session of the Official Section of La Mostra of this edition that is already running, quixotic, about a State of Alarm, a “Curfew” and, Listen, whatever comes your way. A new day with two films with which we had already passed the midpoint of the competition programming (six out of eleven, let's remember).
Kala Azar is the first foray into long-form fiction by Greek-born conceptual artist Janis Rafa.. The title of the film refers to a parasite transmitted to dogs through the bite of a fly that causes their death and that caused a serious problem in the director's native Greece for several years., the production notes of this film tell us. And although this event is not the protagonist of the story, Something of that sensation of animal hecatomb does seem to permeate or threaten the images of this debut. In Kala Azar we found a couple without a name, he and she, united professional and, we will see in the first shots of the movie, sentimentally. They both have a really curious occupation: cremate the pets of the clients of the company they work for. They take care of collecting them, treat them properly and return them to their owners in a nice urn. At the same time, The couple is also responsible for collecting the carcasses of animals they find on the street and trying to give them the “worthy” farewell they deserve.. Besides, her family is there, who lives among dogs, and a group of hunters who meet in a nearby space.
The first thing that should be highlighted Kala Azar It is not a typical story.. As also happened in The traveling salesman, what we mentioned yesterday, Janis Rafa's work is based on a series of situations that aim or seek to provoke or evoke some type of emotions in the viewer.. There is no specific conflict here that must be resolved., but a series of scenes that, delving into the daily lives of the characters, They will give the keys to what is at stake. Thus, We could say that Rafa does not tell, but rather it shows and there it will be the viewer who must find some clues that no one tells him., not even out loud, nor through any trick related to conventional dramaturgy. So, We will see our two protagonists circulating from one place to another serving their clients or having conversations with each other., in appearance, insubstantial. Very close to the couple, Her parents live with a good number of dogs that they take care of as if they were their children and that roam freely throughout the house., as full members of the family. While, a man works on a chicken farm and, on the other side of the fence, a group of hunters hold meetings and practice shooting. How they relate to animals, how they react to certain events and their response, sometimes happy, others uncomfortable, in dealing with some of the people who make up this little world, small elements emerge in such a way that, if we pay attention, We can put together a kind of “message”.
Thus, Janis Rafa's characters become almost abstractions, figures that move but that we do not know intimately beyond those small moments in which they react to an external stimulus. Rafa maintains a certain distance from them, it seems that he watches them, but he decides not to interfere in their lives. And the same thing happens with the other part, the enemy, we could say, that remains even more blurred and whose presence, although we feel it as that threat we talked about before, is hidden from us (we ignore, even, his face), in such a way that it remains, in contrast to the main characters, dehumanized. So, The hunters who live next to the protagonists are almost always shown to us in the distance or out of focus., as if they were an entity without defined factions. And in the background, another threat that takes the form of a degraded and violent urban landscape. A violence that is felt indirectly, but potential. Let's take an example. In one of the sequences, She forces her partner to stop the car in the middle of the highway they are driving on.. On the other side of the road, lies the corpse of a dead dog, foreseeably hit by a vehicle. She tries to cross with the intention of picking him up., but the intensity and speed at which the cars traveling on the road circulate, they prevent it, could endanger your own life. This impossibility fills her with a feeling of frustration and helplessness.. Frustration over the dog's corpse, helplessness for not being able to change things. Based on these very basic parameters, it is developed Kala Azar. That's where it works, in the contrast of those figures, their customs and manners, against that background.
In Janis Rafa's film it is the viewer who, sifting what happens through your own experience, puts what is missing to what is shown. It is at that point when you will connect with what the Greek director is trying to convey. Kala Azar It is a tape that speaks to us, basically the relationship between people and animals in this society we inhabit. However, as it happened with For freedom del kurdo Ersin Çelik, we are facing a clearly militant type of cinema (an animalistic film?). Given this we could find, at least, two types of reactions, that is to say, of spectators. aside, those who feel the experiences that the film teaches as their own and enter intimately into the game of mirrors and reflections that they propose. And another for whom the distance between what is shown and their own vision of the matter feels like an unbridgeable abyss..
with the tape Tereza37 by Croatian director Danilo Serbedzija, We addressed the second proposal of this third day of screenings. A solid tape, not only in the formal aspect, as well as for the rigor and depth with which it addresses what counts and, especially, the construction of their characters.
Tereza, protagonist of this story, She is a thirty-seven-year-old woman who finds herself at a crossroads.. As happened to the protagonist of Children, wants to have children, but, despite all your efforts, can't conceive. Pressured by a family environment that seems to leave her aside, Tereza experiences this lack as a real drama. To this, Added to this is a relationship in which it feels like a second course on the menu.. her husband, operator on a ship, spends long periods of time at sea, far from home and, when he comes back, He shows no signs of feeling great attachment to her or her needs.. It will be in one of his absences when Tereza begins to question herself., not just your marriage, but your whole world.
Tereza37 puts a woman in conflict at the center of the story, again, against a social context that seems to displace her if she does not comply with what is established. In meetings with his mother and sister, at dinners with his friends, feels out of place, away from the game of complicity that marks social norms. That feeling displaced, that does not comply with what is required, weighs on his spirit. As a solution to that situation, Tereza begins to leave that world, to try what, until now, seemed forbidden or inconceivable. Thus, little by little, will take the measure of that interior and exterior confinement to which she feels subjected, finding the escape route you need.
But perhaps the most interesting thing about this entire journey is not found in the possible conclusions that we can draw from this story.. If the device works it is because both Danilo Serbedzija, as its scriptwriter and also the protagonist of this work, Lana Baric, They avoid drawing a straight line towards that exit route from Tereza. The other way around, The path they draw for their protagonist is full of sharp curves and dangerous zigzags.. Knowing the reasons, Nor does he make it clear to us what the ultimate motivations are that encourage his character to do what he does.. And there is your wealth. Serbedzija and Baric's characters make bad decisions, even, For themselves, they are wrong. A bet that, in these dogmatic times, it is to be appreciated. They could well have been tempted to choose another path. In your search for new experiences, Tereza begins to have relationships with other men. But, in those relationships, He doesn't seem to have things very clear.. One of those men is Nikola, with whom he seems to find that love and attention that he does not receive in his own home. However, it doesn't seem enough and he rejects it. In that desire to explore, Tereza walks dangerously on the razor's edge, putting yourself in danger. And that's the most interesting thing of all., because Serbedzija and Baric outline a character of deep nuances, what, just as we can understand, it also slips through our hands.
And the same thing happens with respect to that social context that the film tries to portray.. TRUE, Those social norms that force Tereza to pursue motherhood result in a petty society or, at least, insensitive to the needs and complexities of life. But, at the same time, the attitude of those around her is not always deliberate. It's not that her mother or sister don't love her., is that they are so integrated into that moral order (y, we could say, aesthetic), who simply ignore what happens to them, Although that ignorance can be deeply corrosive.
In the hands of Serbedzija and Baric, Tereza37 It is a film that fundamentally tells us about freedom or that longing for freedom that, somehow, nests in all of us. The problem, they warn us, is that that path to that freedom, if there is, is not drawn. on this tape, all the characters are trying to escape all the time. Tereza, of her marriage and that obligation of being a mother, her best friend tries to leave town, even Nikola, a Serbian immigrant, seems to want to escape from something that is not mentioned. The problem is that, How will our protagonist prove?, that freedom is not found in any specific place, but within us. But, as we say, For that path towards one there is no instruction manual.. G.LEON
