Carlos Reygadas's Battle in Heaven (2005) and Silent Light (2007) are showing April and May, 2019 on Mubi in the United States as part of the series What Is an Auteur?Battle in HeavenEmerging six years after Post Tenebras Lux (2012), Our Time, the latest film from Mexican auteur Carlos Reygadas, offers an unsparing account of a marriage in crisis. Starring the director and his real-life spouse Natalia López (and their children), the film depicts a couple navigating the difficult terrain of an open relationship. Characteristically, Our Time disavows many of the conventions of cinema, adopting an approach that mirrors non-fiction filmmaking to capture the beauty and intimacy of the daily life of the couple and their clan. Shifting his gaze from the human drama at the center of the narrative to the rich environment of the family’s ranch and its surroundings, the director asks challenging questions about the nature of romantic...
- 4/21/2019
- MUBI
Carlos Reygades' Batalla en el Cielo was one of the highly touted Competition film as the Festival de Cannes got under way, but it proves to be a disappointing turn-off. The film deliberately works against most cinematic expectations.
Actors -- or to be accurate, nonactors -- do not even try to communicate any meaning. Scenes are drained of emotions. The cityscape of modern-day Mexico City is observed with documentarylike scrutiny but without any particular point of view.
Batalla en el Cielo -- or Battle in Heaven -- may win more festival dates, but despite the inclusion of graphic though unerotic sex scenes it will be tough to find an audience for a film so determined to puzzle and annoy but not to enlighten.
The movie opens with a scene of fellatio involving a young, attractive woman and an overweight, older and unattractive man. We later learn that Marcos (Marcos Hernandez) works for Ana's father and has been her chauffeur since she was in grade school. Ana (Anapola Mushkadiz) works in a brothel, less for the money, which she clearly does not need, than for the need or thrill of prostituting herself.
Marcos and his doltish wife (Berta Ruiz) have apparently kidnapped the baby of a friend for ransom but the infant has accidentally died. Marcos confesses this to Ana, which he says makes him feel better. Hard to tell though since Reygadas has actors deliver lines in monotones while posed compositionally in awkward and unrealistic postures. The exception is Mushkadiz, who is allowed to act naturally.
The scenes between Marcos and his wife are the stiffest in the film. Their lovemaking scene challenges us not to feel sorry for the actors.
Diego Martinez Vignatti's camera often holds a single static angle for awhile, yet other times indulges in hey-look-at-me tracking shots and one 360-degree panorama of the city. Reygadas ratchets up ambient sounds sometimes to ear-splitting noise levels. Source music ranging from pop to liturgical is often designed to clash with a particular scene.
The strongest character is Mexico City itself. Shot on gray days or with overexposure, the city comes off as soulless as the other personalities in the movie only its congestion, pollution and noise seem to induce a zombielike insanity in the characters.
Catholic and Christian symbols and paintings are everywhere, but religion seems to have no impact on the amoral fools that populate this film.
The act of violence that serves as a climax is as senseless as everything that has gone before it. The movie ends where it began with a final shot of the fellatio artist doing what she does best.
BATALLA EN EL CIELO
BAC Films
Credits: Writer/director: Carlos Reygadas; Producers: Philippe Bober, Carlos Reygadas, Jaime Romandia, Susanne Marian; Director of photography: Diego Martinez Vignatti; Editors: Benjamin Mirguet, Adoracion G. Elipe, Nicolas Schmerkin. Cast: Marcos: Marcos Hernandez; Ana: Anapola Mushkadiz; Marcos' wife: Berta Ruiz; David: David Bornstein; Viky: Rosalinda Ramirez.
No MPAA rating, running time 98 minutes.
Actors -- or to be accurate, nonactors -- do not even try to communicate any meaning. Scenes are drained of emotions. The cityscape of modern-day Mexico City is observed with documentarylike scrutiny but without any particular point of view.
Batalla en el Cielo -- or Battle in Heaven -- may win more festival dates, but despite the inclusion of graphic though unerotic sex scenes it will be tough to find an audience for a film so determined to puzzle and annoy but not to enlighten.
The movie opens with a scene of fellatio involving a young, attractive woman and an overweight, older and unattractive man. We later learn that Marcos (Marcos Hernandez) works for Ana's father and has been her chauffeur since she was in grade school. Ana (Anapola Mushkadiz) works in a brothel, less for the money, which she clearly does not need, than for the need or thrill of prostituting herself.
Marcos and his doltish wife (Berta Ruiz) have apparently kidnapped the baby of a friend for ransom but the infant has accidentally died. Marcos confesses this to Ana, which he says makes him feel better. Hard to tell though since Reygadas has actors deliver lines in monotones while posed compositionally in awkward and unrealistic postures. The exception is Mushkadiz, who is allowed to act naturally.
The scenes between Marcos and his wife are the stiffest in the film. Their lovemaking scene challenges us not to feel sorry for the actors.
Diego Martinez Vignatti's camera often holds a single static angle for awhile, yet other times indulges in hey-look-at-me tracking shots and one 360-degree panorama of the city. Reygadas ratchets up ambient sounds sometimes to ear-splitting noise levels. Source music ranging from pop to liturgical is often designed to clash with a particular scene.
The strongest character is Mexico City itself. Shot on gray days or with overexposure, the city comes off as soulless as the other personalities in the movie only its congestion, pollution and noise seem to induce a zombielike insanity in the characters.
Catholic and Christian symbols and paintings are everywhere, but religion seems to have no impact on the amoral fools that populate this film.
The act of violence that serves as a climax is as senseless as everything that has gone before it. The movie ends where it began with a final shot of the fellatio artist doing what she does best.
BATALLA EN EL CIELO
BAC Films
Credits: Writer/director: Carlos Reygadas; Producers: Philippe Bober, Carlos Reygadas, Jaime Romandia, Susanne Marian; Director of photography: Diego Martinez Vignatti; Editors: Benjamin Mirguet, Adoracion G. Elipe, Nicolas Schmerkin. Cast: Marcos: Marcos Hernandez; Ana: Anapola Mushkadiz; Marcos' wife: Berta Ruiz; David: David Bornstein; Viky: Rosalinda Ramirez.
No MPAA rating, running time 98 minutes.
- 5/18/2005
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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