Mosquito

Here we go again into the African heart of darkness, this time through the hallucinating eyes of a Portuguese WWI soldier lost in more ways than one; a slow-motion fever dream of the dirty deeds of colonialism come to the fore.

A good story where the horrors of Portuguese colonialism are put forward a few times. The base for an incredible movie was there but I felt like I needed more story. More to draw me into Zacaria's mind and more to show me, the viewer, and perhaps the forgetful Portuguese people the truth behind the fairytale like colonialism they learn about in school. I get we don't see a lot of it, since we're going along with Zakaria's journey, but I think small "detours" would be welcomed, so the movie taught us more about what we're watching. A good representation, also, of the meaninglessness of the European wars in Africa and their stupid consequences. The part that didn't fall short at all and the first reason that drew me to watch the movie were the visuals, amazing.

Saw this at the Rotterdam film festival 2020 (IFFR), where it was the official opening film with over 3,000 viewers present, spread over several rooms in the venue. In such a case, you expect something interesting. I know that politicians and sponsors are invited in large numbers to attend occasions like this. Those typically not being the average film festival visitor, I can understand why they selected this movie to open the festival. Having said that, it is not my favorite kind of story, and as such does not work for me, neither as a costume drama nor as a recreation of life as it was a century ago. What is worse, I know of two much better films around a "lost in the jungle" theme, viz. Jungle (2017, by Greg McLean), and Jonathas' Forest, aka A Flores-ta de Jonathas (2012, by Sergio Andrade). These two examples succeeded in letting me feel with the main protagonist, contrary to this one that kept me on a safe distance (proverbially speaking).

Make no mistake, Zacarias is indeed put through a harrowing experience after getting detached from his company, having to wander through an unwelcoming and unforgiving environment. Yet his survival left me cold and uninterested. We heard the infamous sounds of the jungle, continuous through day and night. And we also heard stories about the dangers of all sorts of animals, large and small. We think of lions first, but there was also a story about ants that enter via you ear drums and eat into your brains. You don't need much more to get the idea that you won't wish your worst enemy to be there, especially when having to counter all such dangers without much survival experience and without much knowledge how to cope. The only weap-on our main protagonist had was a bunch of clichés about love for his country and more such pseudo-heroic lines. It was very clear that his superiors were way past that phase, and only responded cynically to the big words of this lowly ranked soldier who was fresh on the front.

To conclude on a more positive note, there are two positive things to say about this movie. Firstly, it is a commendable attempt to visualize African landscapes and local people as of 1917, over a century ago. The scene in the beginning, where africans were used to carry the soldiers across the river, makes very clear who was master and who was slave. Secondly, the movie shows the uselessness of colonial wars, and the waste of promising young men. We saw a random example war here (Portugese against Germans), where innocent young men on both sides carry out the dirty work and put their lives at stake. Don't expect, howev-er, the reenactment of military operations: we hardly see any. The dangers of the unwelcoming jungle were made clear in words but not demonstrated in the proceed-ings. We saw our main protagonist miraculously recover in several occasions from mysterious illnesses, all of which were not explained nor named in the story. Of course, malaria is a plausible candidate, but often we had to outguess what precisely was going on. Part of it were mere suggestions, shown on screen as halluci-nations, some of the time switching back in time, if only to tell us that most of it did not happen for real.

All in all, I sat out the more than two hours running time. A few scenes and events were interesting to see, but most of it went over my head. As said before, there are more interesting movies about the "lost in the jungle" theme that won't leave you untouched, and are not so easily forgettable as this one proved to be (for me, that is). As usual, your mileage may vary.

It's an impressive World War I drama focusing on a portuguese soldier who got lost in the African forest, and it's a visual treat for sure. Zacarias is played really well by João Nunes Monteiro and his "adventure" of misfortunes takes us to the heart of this continent. We see the impact of colonialism (especially at the beginning where the soldiers are transported by african men, something I didn't know that actually happened and would never imagine), the impact of war and how this almost death sentence of being alone on this dangerours territory has great consequences on a young man disillusioned with the riches of being a war hero.

It has a clear influence from "Apocalypse Now", cinematography-wise, with the night being captured perfectly by the camera and with the creation of an almost drug-induced scenery with the bizarre colours all around. It does not create a visceral and deep experience that a movie like this promises, but still, it does really well in what it achieves.

A film with amazing cinematography, acting performances and pathos. Africa seen by a 17 year old scared soldier.