Rating: 2/5
Hooptober 12 | 12/31 | Mexican Director
Mariano carries a stack of broken-down boxes. He fills a barrel with bags of bread he finds and ferments it to create gasoline. He breaks down the bread and seals the barrel. He chops up a table he finds for firewood. After an exchange of gas for eggs, he drops some acid and jams on a snare.
Siblings Lucio and Fauna work their way into Mariano’s building, sharing what little water they have left. When they finally interact with Mariano, he feeds them and hears their story. He allows them to stay, but they must follow his orders.
Doing what? It’s hard to say. But it involves assembling a complex, womb-like structure within the building.
— Solitude […] drags you, forces you to come face to face with your darkest fantasies. And when nothing happens, you stop being afraid of your most grotesque thoughts.
The film has an experimental quality, its pacing oscillating between slow cinema and horror movie tension. At times, it seems to be going for humor, but it often resorts to prolonged questioning.
There is something political in the way they shared in singing the national anthem before killing that guy. Is it simply that Mexico is eating itself? Something about how the grind to survive creates monsters in all of us? Or the boredom of fascism always leads to “defiling the flesh”? Or is it merely #theDirectorsBarelyConcealedFetish?
It’s hard to analyze something that’s so brazenly confrontational. I can appreciate a grotesque allegory, but I appreciate it more when it adds up to something beyond mere despair.