Patricio Guzmán
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“An Auteur’s Cinema in Spite of the Violence”: Patricio Guzmán on The Cordillera of Dreams
Patricio Guzmán is indefatigable. For over 50 years, the Chilean director has chronicled his country’s political trauma—namely, the military coup d’état coup and brutal reign of Augusto Pinochet—with a commitment and passion that is unparalleled. Propelled by a period of tumultuous unrest in Latin America in the 1960s, Guzmán helped forge a radical-left documentary movement, most famously with his momentous trilogy The Battle of Chile (1974-1979), an epic verité street-level account of his nation’s CIA-backed right-wing takeover. But for the last decade, Guzmán may be more recognized for a different type of triptych: Starting with Nostalgia for the Light (2010), and then […]
by Anthony Kaufman on Feb 12, 2020 -
A Festival is its City: Buenos Aires International Independent Film Festival 2015
Buenos Aires, Argentina’s capital, is a big city, at least for me: I live in another capital, Santiago de Chile, but can’t compare how big the two are. That’s especially true when one starts to ask around what’s actually part of Buenos Aires: if the “Conurbano” (poor suburbs surrounding the capital) is included, if here or there is or isn’t part of this “autonomous city.” It’s the same when one starts asking about the importance of the BAFICI (the Spanish acronym for the festival, “Buenos Aires Festival Internacional de Cine Independiente”) or how it has changed with time: you get many responses, […]
by Jaime Grijalba on Jun 4, 2015 -
Previewing Berlinale 2015: Malick, Herzog, Panahi and More
Given that Wong Kar-wai’s The Grandmaster and Wes Anderson’s The Grand Budapest Hotel kicked off the Berlinale the last two years, the response was less than enthusiastic when Isabel Coixet’s Nobody Wants the Night was announced as this year’s opening film (though, predictably, many a Twitter wag delighted in the film title’s pliability for expressing what it is that nobody wants). The Greenland-set period drama stars Juliette Binoche as Josephine, the wife of arctic explorer Robert Peary, and follows her attempt to rejoin her husband on his mission to reach the North Pole. When an Inuit woman comes to her aid on […]
by Giovanni Marchini Camia on Feb 4, 2015 -
Thessaloniki Documentary Festival 2013
Greeks, if not Greece, persist. In March, the 15th edition of the Thessaloniki Documentary Festival presented 76 Greek premieres among its teeming 10 days of attractions, streaming many films across Greece and Cyprus, as well as 520 films in a Market with 55 buyers from around the world. “Here we are again, despite the hardships,” Dimitri Eipides, artistic director of the Thessaloniki International Film Festival and TDF reflected on opening night. Of its 1999 inaugural, he said, “Audiences were skeptical then. The establishment of an internationally acclaimed institution celebrating the art of documentary was something unheard of in Greece. But […]
by Ray Pride on Jul 18, 2013 -
Nostalgia For The Light — A Hammer to Nail Review
(Nostalgia For The Light is now available on DVD and Blu-ray thanks to Icarus Films. It opened theatrically in New York City on March 18, 2011. Visit the film’s official page at the distributor’s site to learn more.) Writing about masterpieces is always difficult, yet in the case of Patricio Guzman’s Nostalgia For The Light, it’s almost crippling. On the one hand, there is enough information and emotion contained within this film’s 90 minutes to justify several thick, glowing texts of appreciation. It’s not merely that Guzman guides us on a journey that tackles just about every grand issue known […]
by Michael Tully on Sep 15, 2011
