First of all this is a
film, framed often by doors and windows and it offers some time a
glimpse to the eternal world and sometimes to a world defined by
frames and borders.
At the beginning a group
photo of some villagers will be made. The father, a respected artisan
who makes altar pieces for churches and little figures made out of
clay for tourists has blindfolded his son who is now describing the
group of villagers in details to test his visual memory. The colours
of their dresses, the woman with the baby in her arm, he recalls
details he need for creating an effigy of it. In this very first shot
one gets an idea of Aparicio L,´s visual sophistication.
Retablo is not only
a film in pure film images but as well a reflection about film images
as well. To experience glimpses of reality and to look at the
reproductions of it, this is a theme which goes through the whole
film.
Subtle but consequently
the film leads image after image to the transformation of a
contemplative world in the Peruvian Andes into a nightmare of
violence and discrimination caused by a man made society. Segundo and
his father do not create only well crafted altarpieces for the church
and souvenirs for tourists but as well miniatures of tiny little clay
puppets based on real villagers. The photo shot in the first scene is
the model of a composition of many tiny clay puppets, arranged like
on a miniature stage and framed by a wooden box. There is one of the
visual most impressing moments of the film: the father and Segundo
contemplate their work of art. We see them open the wooden box, their
eyes in amazement. Behind them a window framed the landscape and it
is like we see both of them staring like on a imagined screen and at
the same time we stare over them to another screen. A crossing of two
glimpses in different directions. The characters and we, each of us
witness how someone sees something. Retablo is indeed a film
about seeing.
Retablo seems to be
a film about two possibilities of cinema, the recording of a real
piece of the world but as well the ability to create a reproduction
of it. The impressing cinema scope photography between open
landscapes and the emphasis of frames (the image format but as well
doors and windows) and sometimes the ensemble of clay figures framed
by the wooden box like a stage, always gives a hint to cinema itself.
The old utopia of cinema to enable us to discover the world or “to
define one´s own image of the world” stays here in contrast to a
society which insist on archaic, patriarchic and stiff images of the
world.
The actor of the
adolescent Segundo, Beyar Roca supports the visual virtuosity of this
film. As he mostly remains silent, his questions, doubt and his
conflicted and confused emotions are all reflected in his stoic
facial expression. It seems to be almost part of this wild and sparse
highland environment.
The permanently increasing
tragic tone of the film is caused by the father´s secret
homosexuality. Once uncovered, he is almost beaten to death by some
villagers. His wife abandons him, most of his work is destroyed. The
miniature of the village community made out of this tiny clay figures
now appears as a hateful, angry and violent mob, the treacherous
security of a community turns into a nightmare.
Retablo is a film
about freedom but as well about its limitations, both visible in
the things the film reveals like houses, doors, - and window frames
or animal compounds but as well perceptible the film´s visual
concept. Cinema seems sometimes breaks out of this borders and
sometimes it reminds us painfully in the existence of these borders
we are exposed to.
At the end we are
literally left in these borders. Segundo leaves his house and his
village to find another place to live and to perform his craft. We
are literally left behind into the darkness of the abandoned house
when he shut the door from outside, a darkness which is the final
caesura between the film and the end credits.
Retablo, the first
film by Peruvian Álvaro Delgado Aparicio L. Comes as close to a
masterpiece as a first film of a young director can be. For sure,
this is one of the finest new films I have seen this year at the
Berlin Film festival – and like it happens so often to me – by a
fortunate accident.
.
Rüdiger Tomczak
ScreeningSat, 24.2, 11.00
Cinemaxx 3
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