the films of Lucrecia Martel, most recently "The Headless Woman"

are you referring to Zama? it was by far the best thing I saw at TIFF last year.

it's hallucinatory without a source fever.

Al, could you expand on this?

Saw Zama tonight, really liked it, totally gorgeous. I like movies that kind of fall apart the farther you go into them. Would be interesting to screen back to back with Aguirre -- Martel's style is cool and detached, vs. Herzog's sweat and blood. (Not that there isn't sweat and blood in Zama, but it's all at a slight remove.)

Isn't colonialism fairly obviously the source fever here?

Loved the way Martel really brought you into this complex world - of animals and people - so that in the last half hour or so, great narrative chunks could be leapt over as the story (and the character) reached endpoint, because by then the viewer (or at least, this viewer) was totally dunked in the whole sensual experience of its colour and sound, and the sense of time fracturing at the edge of the frame.

Recent things it reminded me of - Serra's Death of Louis XIV, German's Hard to be a God, Alonso's Jauja

It impressed me, especially after I rewatched La Cienaga.

Just briefly posted about it on ILE. I liked how Martel tried to get Benedetto's take on the animal world. That amazing shot into the horse's gaze!

The llama was a shameless scene stealer.

This film wasn't 'Bressonian' in the slightest, but the way the animals were filmed did remind me of Balthazar, at times.

Intended to go see Zama today on the basis of the Aguirre and Hard to be a God references upthread but ended up seeing The Holy Girl as there's a mini Martel season going, and I can catch the former later in the week.

There was a half hour making of prior to the movie which dug into Martel's world view a bit and I really liked a lot of what she had to say, if a bit dreamy.

The film itself was a gem, the sound mixing esp. - it paired v well with the very enjoyable Novitiate which I watched last night. I was worried about the where it was heading but it ended very satisfyingly.

Isn't colonialism fairly obviously the source fever here?

Also perhaps malaria? (Finally saw this last night, and have almost no idea what to make of it, other than maybe compare it to the end of Evelyn Waugh's A Handful of Dust?) The only Martel film I'd seen before had been La Cienaga.