Tierra y pan

The movement of camera. The dog. The simplicity of story. The sound of wind. Pieces of a fascinating tragedy ofa family who, in its last half becomes bitter portrait of poverty and deep loneliness. A short film like a poem in which each scene becomes essential symbol .

Desolation and misery in the objective way most people tend to watch or try to avoid seeing is the way director Carlos Armella presents his poetic and sensitive short film "Tierra Y Pan" ("Land and Bread"). A subttle camera movement (as the director calls it) whose frames at first involves a restless dog tied to a fence, but the more the camera slowly moves, we get a different focus on another big story taking place with that first image in the background still calling our attention.

A desert space, a small shack on the left side, the dog's still there barking and moving to the presence of a kid, then a pregnant woman, then a man, a doctor, all through the afternoon. At first, the setting seems a different era, from a relatively distant past but then we see a pickup truck and another conception is formed in our minds. Armella presents a classic technique where the more backwards we go, the more we realize how the context can be changed and be truly presented. The picture as a whole can only be formed when we move backwards, at a certain distance, while the story progresses forward. And then everything changes drastically.

It's not like a short film can be easily spoiled but I preferred to talk more about the way everything unfolded than to reveal about the what and why the story is important...despite the film having a certain topic to cover with all the transitions going on. The technique was brilliantly presented, an amazing cinematographic work that really takes you to that place for a brief moment, no dialogues, with the sound treatment focusing on what's happening all around: the barks, the movements, and the most important of all...the sound of the wind. Chilling.

Watch it and make your own conclusions. It's evident that there's a great relevance to life, specially the situations we tend to overlook or avoid. Makes you get a different perspective at the end of it all. 8/10