1976 – first-look review

As the title of Manuela Martelli’s direc­to­r­i­al debut sug­gests, the year is 1976, and Chile is suf­fo­cat­ing under the night­mare that is Augus­to Pinochet’s dic­ta­tor­ship. Enveloped in the ennui of upper-mid­dle class life, Carmen’s (Aline Kup­pen­heim) con­cerns would not ini­tial­ly seem to align with the sociopo­lit­i­cal tur­moil that her coun­try is fac­ing, even if it only takes a few phone calls and incon­spic­u­ous glances of con­cern to sug­gest the pres­ence of rev­o­lu­tion­ary thrum­mings chip­ping away at her glassy exterior.

While her hus­band Miguel (Ale­jan­dro Goic) stays in San­ti­a­go, where he works as a doc­tor, Car­men takes over the ren­o­va­tions of their fam­i­ly home in the coastal town of Las Cruces. With the unful­filled aspi­ra­tions of going into med­i­cine her­self, Car­men is urged by local priest Father Sanchez (Hugo Med­i­na) to treat the gun­shot wound of a young man named Elías (Nicolás Sepúlve­da). Father Sanchez informs her that Elías is a ​“com­mon crim­i­nal”, yet we’re almost instant­ly aware that this is no pet­ty thief, but a vic­tim of polit­i­cal persecution. 

Kup­pen­heim is har­row­ing in her por­tray­al of the weary Car­men. Entrap­ment, para­noia and a grow­ing sense of polit­i­cal awak­en­ing are deft­ly embod­ied with intense nuance and com­plex­i­ty – so much so that Martelli’s film (billed as a polit­i­cal dra­ma) becomes a cap­ti­vat­ing char­ac­ter study fil­tered through the genre ele­ments of a polit­i­cal thriller. Cig­a­rette always in hand, fear and appre­hen­sion begin to coat every fibre of Carmen’s being as the illu­sion of a life of bour­geois com­plic­i­ty, com­fort and leisure begins to shatter.

Mar­iá Portugal’s score is remark­ably unnerv­ing as it ebbs, flows, surges and spi­rals out of con­trol, the cam­era vibrat­ing to its sin­is­ter tones and com­ple­ment­ing Jesi­ca Suárez’s sound design. Fibres scratch their way into ply­wood as brush­strokes paint the walls of Carmen’s hol­i­day home a peachy sun­set pink. Else­where, Car­men tries to evade a car tail­ing her and flash­ing its head­lights in intim­i­da­tion, while ​’70s synths grow inex­orably more sin­is­ter, cre­at­ing a mount­ing sense of dread and fore­bod­ing that sim­ply refus­es to dissipate.

A score this abra­sive has the poten­tial to become over­bear­ing and dis­tract­ing, yet the severe ten­sion and pure hor­ror it injects into Martelli’s film is per­fect­ly jux­ta­posed by the tac­tile imprints and ges­tur­al details of Yarará Rodríguez’s cin­e­matog­ra­phy: paint droplets stain­ing Carmen’s heels; bits of paper being torn and slid into Ital­ian trav­el guides; blood being wrung out of wash­cloths. All this and the sup­ple­men­tal visu­al flour­ish­es added by Carmen’s sense of fash­ion and inte­ri­or design. 

Despite the priv­i­leges afford­ed to Car­men through her class, her posi­tion as a woman is rel­e­gat­ed to the suf­fo­cat­ing realm of silent domes­tic­i­ty by the patri­ar­chal forces at play. As well as boast­ing an all-female crew, Martelli’s film exquis­ite­ly evokes Carmen’s mut­ed rev­o­lu­tion­ary spir­it, mak­ing for an invalu­able demon­stra­tion of fem­i­nine rev­o­lu­tion­ary cinema.

Lit­tle White Lies is com­mit­ted to cham­pi­oning great movies and the tal­ent­ed peo­ple who make them.

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