Agenda

Nostalgia for the Light 2010 (Nostalgia de la Luz) This film which has received astounding reviews is a rare combination... it brings together the "poetic" and "documentary" to create a new, deeper kind of cinema. The very premise of the film itself is surreal in its juxtaposition of two events... in a remote stretch of desert in Chile there is a an unusually clear view of the night sky where astronomers flock to study the most distant and oldest galaxies. But in that same desert, buried underground, are the bones of political prisoners who "disappeared" during the Pinochet dictatorship. So as the astronomers scan the skies and lay out maps of the heavens, women are digging into the earth looking for their loved ones.

Directed by one of Chile's leading filmmakers- Patricio Guzmán, who in a conversation at the 2010 Cannes film festival described the movie as "metaphysical, mystical or spiritual, astronomical, ethnographic and political." Its a film where memories of the past flicker through into the present time and become eternal. A sort of sociological version of Tarkovsky's Mirror! Guzmán is as much a poet, essayist, historian, ethnographer and philosopher as a filmmaker. His film is closer to the films of Chris Marker than they are to the blunt documentaries mostly made today. An amazing achievement, full of stunning visuals. Just look at Rotten Tomatoes...39 critic reviews, 100% positive feedback. Certainly one of the very best documentaries of recent years. This will be a rare one time screening of this film!

One critic wrote "I first watched Chilean film-maker Patricio Guzmán’s remarkable meditation on cosmic time and political violence with friends in Highgate, London. Afterward, eyes smeared in tears, we looked at each other in silence. We were startled into silence." And since its Tuesday at Cavia, it will of course be a wonderful HD projection.

Directed by Patricio Guzmán 90 minutes In Spanish with English subtitles