Film Notes: No Somos Animales (2013)

[source]

Watched on 8/22/17 with my mother and father (he recommended it). What a film! I just saw it and I feel like it needs to marinate for a little bit before I can say anything meaningful– a second viewing seems very necessary, maybe more–but I also feel that writing now will help me parse and process its sprawling landscape.

One character claimed the movie they were making was supposed to be like a painting. This works for the overall film as well, or at least I felt it could by the end, especially when we linger on the shot of the pier after the heartwarming story about father (played by director Alejandro Agresti) and son looking at the night sky. However, I don’t know if I would have thought of it as a painting if it wasn’t mentioned.

One character claimed that film criticism is dead, and that no one reads anything about films anymore. I suppose that’s true for many, but I enjoy reading and writing about films.

I learned things about Argentina that I did not know before, and even just for that I’d say this film is worth watching– as a veiled documentary.

It contains discussions of all kinds of violence; throughout, even in the darkest moments, I felt a constructive undercurrent in the filmmakers’ intentions. I don’t know if it was there, but it felt that way to me, so they succeeded in creating a sense of trust– I trusted them to handle this content with care and purpose.

I have no idea how much of the actors’ performance was role-play and how much, if any, was them being themselves on screen. Regardless, the acting was great, in that it evoked in me strong feelings and seemed genuine. The only faces I’d seen before were John Cusack’s and Al Pacino’s (the latter was splattered on the Netflix thumbnail although he plays only a minor role, but who can blame the marketers? Then again, as the character Pesto says, ~“advertising is a horrible thing, is it not?”~).

In fact, I have no idea how this film was made, because it’s entirely possible that the production process mirrored the chaotic production process of the film-within-the-film.

I don’t know if it was recorded on film or digital cameras. I sometimes noticed the grain of film but it could have been digitally recreated because there were other moments that clearly showed digital enhancement of a high ISO.

I don’t know if there was a completed script that was filmed or if it was largely improvised. I can’t say I know anything about how this movie was likely made, and I can’t say that it actually matters.

The feeling I got from No Somos Animales was resilient wonder laced with melancholy. I am not well-informed about Jackson Pollock’s work (I have seen one piece of his in the NY Guggenheim), but he was mentioned in the film, and if the viewing experience was meant to evoke an abstract feeling like one of his paintings might, then I imagine my emotional reaction may have been the intended one.

I liked the line from one of the characters that the quality of film they were making was barely above masturbation (intellectual or otherwise), but that they were at least willing to admit it.

It seems that the film offers the viewer a choice as to where to apply their curiosity during the viewing experience: either we can mainly pursue questions of how the film was made and structured, or we can mainly focus on the emotional and personal reactions we have to it. To me personally, doing one makes the other difficult. Despite my impulse to wonder about the production process, in the end I was pulled into the heart of the film and engaged with it first and foremost emotionally. If this was the intended effect, I’d say it was successful.

And regardless of its success or failure (a dichotomy its characters overtly criticize), it did something for me, so I am glad I saw it. There is no doubt in my mind that multiple viewings will reveal more.