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LISANDRO ALONSO PRIMER

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Tomorrow one of cinema’s recent poets Lisandro Alonso arrives in our city for a complete retrospective of his work. While the film forum is responsible for touring Alonso latest film LIVERPOOL throughout the US and Canada, we’ll also be engaging him in several Seattle based cinematic activities; introductions, Q & A’s, a master class, but perhaps most interesting amongst them we’re commissioning a short film as part of our one-shot film commission series. The first international filmmaker and the only one who is a sort of master of the one-shot , we’re giddy with excitement as Alonso takes the helm.

In the meantime I thought I’d provide you with a comprehensive primer on Alonso and his films. Below you’ll find a series of links to various articles, essays and interviews. These links, arranged according to film title, date of production, articles, etc, can also serve as a kind guide into the directors unique aesthetic approach.Hope to see you at his films this week!

S/T sin titulo (2009) Short – BAFICI 2009

Liverpool (2008) IMDb link – Quinzaine des Réalisateurs Cannes 2008

Fantasma (2006) IMDb link – Cannes 2006

Los Muertos (2004) IMDb link – Cannes 2004

  • “Le deuxième souffle” By: Jean-Philippe Tessé (Cahiers du cinéma, n° 590; May 2004) [FRENCH]
  • “L’épopée stupéfiante d’un solitaire” By: Jacques Mandelbaum (Le Monde; 15 May 2004) [FRENCH]
  • “Des acteurs vierge de cinéma” By: Thomas Sotinel (Le Monde; 15 May 2004) [FRENCH]
  • “Lisandro Alonso : géométrie variable” By: Emmanuèle Frois (Le Figaro, 15 May 2004) [FRENCH]
  • “That’s How a Man Lives” By: Andy Rector (FIPRESCI; 2004)
  • “L’ oubli et l’oubli” By: Sylvain Coumoul (Cahiers du cinéma, n° 595, Nov 2004) [FRENCH]
  • “L’enfer vert” By: Vincent Ostria (Les Inrocks; 3 Nov 2004) [FRENCH]
  • “Bouffée d’anxiogène” By: Didier Péron (Libération; 3 Nov 2004) [FRENCH]
  • “Los Muertos” By: Jacques Morice (Télérama; 3 Nov 2004) [FRENCH]
  • “Lisandro Alonso filme son tropisme pour la vie sauvage” By: Thomas Sotinel (Le Monde; 6 Nov 2004) [FRENCH]
  • “Los Muertos end credits” By: Zach Campbell (a_film_by, 23 Feb 2005)
  • “Los Muertos, 2004” By: acquarello (Strictly Film School, 19 Feb 2005)
  • “Los Muertos, 2004” By: Mohit Sabharwal (The New Delhi Biscuit Company, 24 Apr 2005)
  • “Lisandro Alonso. Bevrijd in de jungle” By: Gabe Klinger (Filmkrant, #270, Oct 2005) [DUTCH]
  • “Films That Got Away” By: Andy Rector (KINO SLANG; 1 Jul 2006)
  • “Got Your Goat” By: Nathan Lee (The Village Voice; 27 March 2007)
  • “Los Muertos” By: Matt Zoller Seitz (NYT; 5 Apr 2007)
  • “Los Muertos”, “Quiet City” By: Michael Atkinson (IFC; 28 Jan 2008)
  • “Los Muertos (Lisandro Alonso, 2004)” By: grunes (Dennis Grunes, 23 Jul 2008)
  • “Lisandro Alonso『Los Muertos』” By: maplecat-eve (maplecat-eve Diary; 5 Oct 2009) [JAPANESE]

La Libertad (2001) IMDb link – NYFF 2001

  • “Conquista argentina” By: Michel Eltchaninoff (Synopsis; May 2001) [FRENCH]
  • “La Libertad” By: Vincent Ostria (Les Inrocks; 9 May 2001) [FRENCH]
  • “Eloge du dénuement” By: Thomas Sotinel (Le Monde; 12 May 2001) [FRENCH]
  • “Un jour sans fin” By: Michel Eltchaninoff (Synopsis; 5 June 2001) [FRENCH]
  • “Le dernier des hommes” By: Serge Kaganski (Les Inrockuptibles; 30 Oct 2001) [FRENCH]
  • “Les petits riens de la journée d’un bûcheron de la Pampa. Authentique” By: Aurélien Ferenczi (Télérama #2703; 31 Oct 2001) [FRENCH]
  • “La libertad” By: Nicolas Azalbert (Cahiers du cinéma, n° 562; Nov 2001) [FRENCH]
  • “Au fond de la forêt, l’épopée du quotidien” By: Jean-Michel Frodon (Le Monde; 2 Nov 2001) [FRENCH]
  • “La Libertad. Film argentin de Lisandro Alonso” By: Aurélien Ferenczi (Télérama, 3 Nov 2001) [FRENCH]
  • “Festival de Gijón 2006. Entrevista con Lisandro Alonso” (tren de sombras; 29 Nov 2006) [SPANISH]
  • “Guadalajara Film Fest, Entry 1” By: Robert Koehler (Film Journey; 9 March 2008)
  • “Brief thoughts on La libertad” By: Zach Campbell (Elusive Lucidity; ?)

Dos en la vereda (1995) short

 

GENERAL BIBLIOGRAPHY

 

GENERAL ONLINE ARTICLES

INTERVIEW
TEXT BY Lisandro ALONSO

I came back from walking for two or three hours along the uninhabited streets in the outskirts of town.  The truth is I don’t know what I was looking for.  I was thinking about other places and trying to find some common characteristics and attitudes of the people that live there.  I arrived ten or fifteen days ago and feel that I know the main streets of town as if I had been raised there since I was a little boy.

In reality I was tired of searching for something without knowing where my search would lead me to.  I was unable to speak and converse with the people, so I planned where I was going to eat but moreover what I was going to drink.  If I start with wine, beer, whisky,
Everything depended upon the hour of the day and how I wanted to arrive at the end of the evening that in reality was short because in that time night fall came late and cleared up early, but the thing I cared about were those hours of the night and who walked the streets because I was looking for a man from a bar, a drunk that for certain would drink at whatever hour without a care.

Now I was in bed in a small family run inn staring at the ceiling about to take a nap.  I had already made a few calls to Buenos Aires and everything was normal, those unforeseen expenses came a little bit later.  I remember the voices in the house, more than other those of the boys running through the kitchen and fighting for the TV, the wals were very thin and you could hear everything so clearly, also the boys’ Grandfather was always there telling stupid stories.  They also heard me come in at whatever hour of the day or night but since I traveled alone it didn’t cause any major problems between us.

I decided to film a film en southern Argentina, some call it the end of the world but in reality its not although one does feel very far removed, lost…I decided to I wanted to film something that had to do with the sea, with being faraway from everything, someone that came back with out know why, maybe to see if their mother was still living in the same place where they had been born, maybe to see if their mother was still alive, but moreover this was just an excuse to get off the boat and dedicate oneself to emptying glasses and filling them up again and emptying them anew.

I didn’t know really know what I was searching for and so it was difficult to find something, of course there are times that at first glance one perceives of something as strange, people that seem to be out of place, and to find them you just have to be there and wait for them to appear.  Days before I spent a few hours in a school for the disabled, spending a few hours with them and talking with the teachers who would put music on in order to allow the kids to leave their own little world or share their world for a moment, a world that always gave me so much curiousity to learn more about, to enter into the mystery, but not to stay only to see what they feel.  There were all kinds there, but in general they were sweet, I took some photos of the girls with the least degree of  disability because I was also looking for a disabled girl for the film, one that could use the bathroom herself and walk without problems.

To be in the school was a relief because I didn’t feel the pressure of walking the streets searching for something, being with the kids and taking them around in their wheel chairs from one side of the room to the other made me feel useful and furthermore it made me laugh so much.  I felt like I could say anything that came to my mind without having to have a dialogue or wait for a response that had meaning.  What’s your name? I asked one of them, they told me Mountain.  After four or five hours in the school I hadn’t really spoken much, just to ask for food and a few beers.  Afterwards I returned home to read for a bit and stare at the ceiling.  The film will be called Liverpool and I hope they like it.

Published in Ekran, 2007 (November/December)

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This entry was posted on November 9, 2009 at 1:18 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

2 Responses to “LISANDRO ALONSO PRIMER”

  1. Lisandro Alonso in Seattle (and in the World) | Parallax View Says:
    November 12, 2009 at 2:02 pm

    […] Lisandro Alonso Primer (links and more at Hot Splice) Unspoken Cinema’s Lisandro Alonso page (links) Liverpool reviews and features (links at Auteurs Notebook) […]

  2. HarryTuttle Says:
    November 26, 2009 at 8:31 am

    I hope my link page was helpful… No need to thank me, it’s my pleasure.

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