Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

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serifmehmet
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Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#1 Post by serifmehmet » Sun Aug 27, 2017 3:52 am


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colinr0380
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Re: Trailers for Upcoming Films

#2 Post by colinr0380 » Sun Aug 27, 2017 6:47 am

That looks very interesting. I'm not familiar with the source material so it has only just struck me that it feels as if this could be in the same territory of Aguirre, Wrath of God, or the 1988 Calos Saura El Dorado! It looks as if that kind of historical setting will be fruitful territory for Martel's intermingling racial-class-gender tensions themes, and I'm loving the soundscape created just for that trailer!

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AidanKing
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Re: Festival Circuit 2017

#3 Post by AidanKing » Thu Aug 31, 2017 4:38 am

Lucrecia Martel's Zama has been very well received by The Guardian. It sounds as if it may become known as the film with the llama in the same way Le Quattro Volte was described as the film with the goats.

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DarkImbecile
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Re: The Films of 2018

#4 Post by DarkImbecile » Fri May 11, 2018 6:11 pm

That off-kilter feeling when you're trapped in one of those intense anxiety dreams in which you struggle against seemingly endless obstacles - from the banal to the absurd to the extreme - to achieve a relatively simple objective, and the queasy uneasiness keeps sliding sideways right up to the border of full-fledged nightmare territory? Lucretia Martel's Zama is that feeling committed to film.

Most of this sensation stems from Martel's elliptical and idiosyncratic capturing of the various contradictions inherent in the messy colonial insertion of a bureaucracy, ideology, and economy into an unwelcoming and often incompatible culture and geography; like an attempt to recreate a famous photograph by carving it onto a tree trunk with the point of a shovel, one might do well enough that you can make out the echoes of something familiar, but the compromises and corruptions of the original will always be the second version's most notable features. Colonialism's inherent flaws and failings are constantly on display in ways both direct and subtle, as in the ridiculousness of giving an ornate canopy bed to a native woman who lives in an open hut near the riverside, or the pursuit of narrow-minded and short-sighted interests and goals by the various governors who cycle through the film.

Martel's images are often captivating - especially in the film's final third as the location photography grows more stunning and the plot developments grow increasingly surreal and threatening - and the wry humor hits largely the right tone throughout. The film does sag a bit in the second act (though I'm near certain that having a better sense of the film as a whole would make this less of an issue on repeat viewings), and the disorientation and alienation - Martel's signature as much as anything - that are so ably leveraged here also made me almost reflexively distanced from Zama in a way that blunted some of its impact in certain scenes.

Becoming steadily more unmoored from his foundations the longer he fails to extricate himself from this environment is Don Diego de Zama, who from the film's opening moments is constantly denied anything he might desire (a transfer, a lover, a way out) and given 'gifts' he doesn't want and can't fully reject or escape (a troublesome book, a bastard). Daniel Gimenez Cacho's lead performance is well-tuned to the character - passive when he should be decisive, aggressive when he should show restraint, all while beset with an increasing sense of both exasperation and resignation. Central to nearly every frame of the film, Gimenez Cacho does solid work in balancing the unlikable aspects of his character with the relatable and fairly straightforward goals he's trying to achieve and his constant bemusement at the results.

This ends up as a film I respect more than enjoy, but the more I reflect on it the more it improves, especially the craft elements that went into photographing and editing some key scenes in the last half-hour.

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DarkImbecile
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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#5 Post by DarkImbecile » Fri May 11, 2018 6:50 pm

Whoops! I thought I had saved that as a draft, not posted it! I suppose it’s appropriate that my thoughts on this movie are somewhat disconnected and not quite cohesive, but hopefully the point is in there somewhere.

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All the Best People
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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#6 Post by All the Best People » Sat May 12, 2018 7:23 pm

Caught up with this last week. The only other Martel film I'd seen was La Cienaga, which I was with for twenty minutes before it just kept repeating itself and ended horribly. This was much better, though I'm not sure I totally embraced it. The atmosphere -- sound design in particular was strong -- and that's the biggest thing it has going for it, as the "colonists as buffoonish bullies slowly going crazy" thing isn't exactly fresh on our screens. Many striking images and sequences, however. We'll see how it sits and dwells with me in the months to come. Certainly worth seeing on the big screen, due to its beauty, mood, and audioscapes.

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DarkImbecile
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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#7 Post by DarkImbecile » Wed May 23, 2018 12:14 am

A Film Comment podcast on Zama, including the award-winning translator of the source novel providing some insight into Martel's interpretations of and deviations from Antonio di Benedetto's work and the influence of Kafka.

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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#8 Post by razumovsky » Wed May 23, 2018 3:46 pm

I saw this last night, followed by a Q and A with Lucrecia Martel herself. She has a nice line in dry humour, which had the Spanish-speakers behind me in stitches - waiting for the translation probably diluted the impact somewhat.

One thing she said that seems apposite to some of the comments above, about the film's dream-like quality, is that she is very relaxed with the idea of people falling asleep during it. She said that she has seen Bergman's Silence, one of her favourite films, a hundred times, and has fallen asleep each time! I suspect she was being slightly mischievious, but all the same she said that a film is still working on us when we are not fully conscious, not least through its sound.

Feels only fair to add that I did not fall asleep during the screening, and once I had adjusted to its walking pace, I was absorbed. I found myself thinking about Lisandro Alonso's Jauja, which it recalled, but perhaps only superficially.


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Omensetter
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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#10 Post by Omensetter » Tue Jul 10, 2018 10:24 am

Not that it matters ultimately, but in the latest Film Comment Kent Jones mentions that Zama was rejected outright from the 2017 Cannes Film Festival, where it would have had to play OOC or UCR because of Almodovar's presence on the jury. It played a sidebar at Venice. At one point, this film was arguably the most-anticipated among the cinephile set---the return of Martel after three staggering salvos justifying the furor.

So I suppose if one is worried about this year's rejected films---Reygadas, Leigh---then worry not.

Regardless, it remains my most anticipated for the year and hopefully Netflix---which apparently is dvd.com now---will carry it. If not, I'm fortunate to have access to a good public library.

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dda1996a
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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#11 Post by dda1996a » Tue Jul 10, 2018 11:03 am

Omensetter wrote:
Tue Jul 10, 2018 10:24 am
Not that it matters ultimately, but in the latest Film Comment Kent Jones mentions that Zama was rejected outright from the 2017 Cannes Film Festival, where it would have had to play OOC or UCR because of Almodovar's presence on the jury. It played a sidebar at Venice. At one point, this film was arguably the most-anticipated among the cinephile set---the return of Martel after three staggering salvos justifying the furor.

So I suppose if one is worried about this year's rejected films---Reygadas, Leigh---then worry not.

Regardless, it remains my most anticipated for the year and hopefully Netflix---which apparently is dvd.com now---will carry it. If not, I'm fortunate to have access to a good public library.
Quoting Reygadas himself, his new film will come out in September

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BenoitRouilly
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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#12 Post by BenoitRouilly » Tue Jul 17, 2018 3:29 pm

razumovsky wrote:
Wed May 23, 2018 3:46 pm
I found myself thinking about Lisandro Alonso's Jauja, which it recalled, but perhaps only superficially.
Same here. I found a real similarity of atmosphere, pace, wait, longing, dread, surrealim... But I prefered Jauja in the end, much stronger. But I agree that some of the scenes toward the end are beautifully photographed and choreographed.
I thought the eerie soundscape, too anti-realist, too dreamlike in a kitsch way, took away from the realist film. Luckily not all the film is absorbed by these distracting sounds.
All the more disappointed because I loved her first films in particular La Cienaga and La Niña Santa!

Another film that I'm reminded of is Zurlini's The Desert of the Tartars (1976), which has a comparable wait/longing and nonesensical military bureaucracy.

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bdsweeney
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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#13 Post by bdsweeney » Tue Dec 10, 2019 12:20 am

This was a bit of a curiosity, but I'm not sure I found much more to it than that. There's certainly elements to admire: the over saturated colours of the landscape are nicely surrealist, the set direction feels well 'lived in' rather than being simply for the film's purposes ...
And I enjoyed some parts of its non sequitur-type humour (e.g. it's a cute llama). It's obvious Martel has the smarts to use sound and image to capture senses, tones, emotions to describe the non-concrete and intangible. (Earlier in this thread, DarkImbecile describes this well.) I particularly like how it captures anxiety at the precise moment you're feeling it.

But I kinda wished it amounted to more. Yes, bureaucracy, self-doubt, self-aggrandisement ... and (by extension) colonialism are certainly ripe and well-worth targets for black humour and taking the piss out of. But it all feels a bit one-note ... one joke that's drawn out for far too long. More so, it all feels a bit too obvious in how it comes across; like it's congratulating the audience for being so self aware. Frankly, to me, it feels condescending. Maybe that's the point? So, you just end up watching a narrative which feels threadbare because you 'got' everything in the first 20 minutes and in which you have no investment. Your mind wonders about the sub-text in an incidental manner (you're grasping for something of curiosity) instead of having any real, honest interest in the film moment to moment

This is the third of Martel's features I've seen ... I felt much the same about the other two. And it's a pity, because I love hearing her in conversation and her taste in films. I keep hoping one of them will click with me, but I find them pretty off-putting.

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Luke M
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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#14 Post by Luke M » Sun Jan 12, 2020 3:45 am

I watched this tonight because in the latest issue of Film Comment, they named it their #1 movie of the decade.

I feel like bdsweeney summed up my thoughts better than I can currently. It's interesting. That's the best I can do. Maybe there's something a second or third viewing can unearth. I hate going into a movie with any kind of expectation especially one as lofty as 'best of the decade' but I'm not disappointed. I'm simply blah on the whole thing. Anyhow, to not make this post entirely useless, I can say at least, it's streaming on Amazon Prime.

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therewillbeblus
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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#15 Post by therewillbeblus » Sun Jan 12, 2020 3:56 am

Luke M wrote:
Sun Jan 12, 2020 3:45 am
It's interesting. That's the best I can do. Maybe there's something a second or third viewing can unearth. I hate going into a movie with any kind of expectation especially one as lofty as 'best of the decade' but I'm not disappointed. I'm simply blah on the whole thing.
I might wind up saying more on it one day, but while I didn’t think Zama was one of even last year’s top ten, I liked it a lot the second time after an initial perplexing viewing, but one that made me feel it needed another try and I’m glad it did. Your initial impressions were similar to mine, so I’d recommend another watch some day.

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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#16 Post by nitin » Sun Jan 12, 2020 6:25 am

Not sure about best film of the decade but it is pretty excellent, your mileage will probably depend a lot on how well you respond to (ravishingly shot) deadpan absurdist satire. Bunuel is sort of the easy comparison but even that is a little superficial.

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tehthomas
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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#17 Post by tehthomas » Sun Jan 12, 2020 12:55 pm

ZZZama?

Laughed when I saw this as the #1 of the decade.. probably to spark debate and have FC trending among Film Twitter.

Nasir007
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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#18 Post by Nasir007 » Sun Jan 12, 2020 6:56 pm

I feel it is a fantastic film - but a very demanding film.

I really do believe that this is one of the films - which without reading the book - will be confounding on the first watch. Re-watches might eliminate the need to read the book, but not everyone re-watches (me most of all). So if you are looking to get everything out of a single viewing, I think it is most advisable to read the book.

The book is a slim volume so it is not a tall order.

I think the film is elliptical and kinda confronting in its atonal dissonance in some ways. It never quite gives you a sure footing. Which is part of the reason why it is a successful film - it is deliberately disorienting. That said, it is also a very Film Comment choice. FC is a very insular group, an echo chamber essentially and in a way that is a good thing, atleast they are eccentric. They are like Cahiers, once you are on their wavelength, you know what they like. Like say Mia Madra - a very Cahiers choice but makes sense in the context of the cinema that Cahiers likes.

Same way with Zama - might seem an atypical choice but within the context of FC - makes total sense. Count me a fan. But it is indeed not an easy film to love, though it is easy to admire the boldness of it vision and the achievement of its execution.

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therewillbeblus
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Re: Zama (Lucrecia Martel, 2018)

#19 Post by therewillbeblus » Sun Jan 12, 2020 8:16 pm

nitin wrote:
Sun Jan 12, 2020 6:25 am
Not sure about best film of the decade but it is pretty excellent, your mileage will probably depend a lot on how well you respond to (ravishingly shot) deadpan absurdist satire. Bunuel is sort of the easy comparison but even that is a little superficial.
That’s a good description, and once I got on the film’s wavelength (it admittedly took me most of a viewing) it was easier to go back and appreciate more rather than figuring out what was going on. I wouldn’t be surprised if a third revisit landed it on my decade list when we do a top 50

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