Nostalgia della luce

A painting that unites astronomy, the present, the past and the collective memory of a people. A story you through from end to end and leaves you vibrating in a note holding and is resonating very hard in the chest. How to join two things as seemingly dissimilar as astronomy and the search for a past that still bleeds and want silent but still present. The astronomers point their telescopes to the huge big sky of Atacama to find new galaxies, stars lost or the same origin of the universe, and the telescope is pointing Guzman inward consciousness of a people and of horror to keep the memory alive.

Thanks Patrick for this film as needed.

This film is not a documentary in the traditional sense. It is more a work of poetry, or a spiritual experience.

The brutal results of Pinochet's military dictatorship are meshed with the search for the origins of the universe. Both subjects deal with the past, as we only have past and future; there is no present as Augustine said many years ago.

So, astronomers are really archaeologists. They study space to discover the past. Writer/director Patricio Guzmán combines this "archaeology" with the archaeologists who search the desert for the bodies buried by Pinochet.

A fascinating story.

The Atacama Desert in Chile is believed to be one of the driest places in the world. Some of its river beds have not seen water for more than 120,000 years. Because of its high altitude, nearly non-existent cloud cover, dry air, and lack of light pollution and radio interference from the very widely spaced cities, the desert is one of the best places in the world to conduct astronomical observations.

As a result, the world's astronomers flock to the Atacama to gaze out into the universe and to search for evidence and artifacts from the beginning of time. These "archaeologists of time" decompose the stars into their constituent elements one of which is calcium.

Elsewhere in the desert, other "archaeologists" search among the pebbles and dust for evidence of calcium. They are looking for bones. Or at least fragments of bones. They are the mothers, brothers, sisters and wives of Chile's disappeared. During Pinochet's military dictatorship many thousands of Chileans were abducted and killed and their bodies disposed of in the Atacama. Forty years later their relatives still search the desert for any sign or bone fragment that might give a clue to where their loved ones lie.

Patricio Guzman juxtaposes these two sets of archaeologists in his beautiful documentary, "Nostalgia for the Light". In many ways they both seek answers to the same question. They try to find the true meaning of life.

There are some very moving scenes in this movie. In one, a lady in her seventies sits in the desert, in tears, and proclaims that she will never stop looking for the remains of her loved one. In the other, a young Chilean astronomer, whose parents were killed by the government when she was only one, clutches her new born baby (this scene is just wonderful). She displays the transcendent wisdom of someone of far greater years as she explains how she has, through her work and observations, come to terms with their murder.

An unmissable movie.

http://sofia-notes.blogspot.com/2011/09/nostalgia-for-light.html

"Nostalgia for the light" takes us on a journey through Chile's Atacama's desert. Throughout this documentary, Patricio Guzman becomes a key interlocutor weaving images, interviews and poetics. This story of a nation's history, pain, joy, discovery and the unknown pulls us into a well of thought.

A group of women search for their beloved ones killed during Pinochia's Military dictatorship. Astronomers discover the early beginnings of life. Archaeologists narrate the history of lost civilizations. They revisit the desert each time in search for answers to the same questions.

We shift through two realms through the ethereal sounds and sights that form throughout the film. The past, present and future constitute our lives. Amnesia is a nation's curse up until front- liners revive history.

The great telescopes of the Atacama desert, they look into the sky as well as our hearts. In our lifetimes the Pinochet regime tortured and/or killed over 60,000 people. This enthralling documentary, both sorrowful and hopeful, explores how stars, history and victims as well as survivors of an oppressive regime merge into one.

The images of a body with legs still chained and wrists bound, people digging in the desert for remains of their loved ones, a country that does not acknowledge the recent past, the testimony of a woman who lost her parents and drawings from the Chacabuco concentration camp merge with images of galaxies and supernovas, and talk of a current of energy, new life, pulsing through our existence. It is powerful stuff. Transitions and better organization are all that are wanting with this film.