Man­aka­mana

There’s an incli­na­tion to describe Stephanie Spray and Pacho Velez’s mes­mer­ic film Man­aka­mana as an exper­i­men­tal doc­u­men­tary, even though there would be a strong argu­ment against both descrip­tors. The exper­i­men­tal tag derives from the fact that, struc­tural­ly, the film com­pris­es of eleven long takes from the inte­ri­or van­tage of that ​’70s action movie sta­ple – the cable car cab­in. And you might see a doc­u­men­tary in there because the cam­era is allowed to sta­t­i­cal­ly observe pas­sen­gers in tran­sit, some sat idly sur­vey­ing the mag­nif­i­cent land­scape below, some tak­ing the time to engage in the rare art of con­ver­sa­tion, some wrestling with ice-based sun­dries, and some not even of the human species.

The film offers the view­er time to lux­u­ri­ate in this lim­i­nal space and impose per­son­al mean­ing onto the images. As with an actu­al cable car ride, a flur­ry of bit­ter­sweet excite­ment is gen­er­at­ed as the exit sta­tion floats into view; the con­tin­u­ing jour­ney is sanc­tioned, but the con­fined repose from life that comes from trav­el­ling in a small met­al box is sad­ly over. Every cut equates to a hard jolt, empha­sised by the heady fly­ing sen­sa­tion of the pre­ced­ing long takes. And there’s also the ele­ment of sur­prise (and com­e­dy!) too, as we sud­den­ly get to see which pas­sen­ger Spray and Velez will choose to sit in on next. Even though it is a bunch of long, sin­gle takes, Man­aka­mana is one of the best edit­ed films of 2014, as the com­bi­na­tion of per­son­al­i­ties feels vital to what the film is express­ing about diver­si­ty and human moti­va­tion. The order in which these peo­ple are pre­sent­ed nev­er once feels arbitrary.

It may sound trite to say so, but the film is about noth­ing and it’s about every­thing. It allows you to see as much or as lit­tle as you want. Maybe some will see it as a quaint peo­ple-watch­ing com­e­dy which explores facial expres­sions, age, beau­ty and still­ness? Oth­ers might see it as a being more of a cin­e­mat­ic work, pos­ing ques­tions about the rela­tion­ship between sub­ject and cam­era, the rela­tion­ship between sub­ject and direc­tor, and even whether this is a film in which the indus­try term ​“direc­tor” is even valid? You could even ingest it as a pure­ly ambi­ent work, and in the spir­it of the pas­sen­gers them­selves, take the prac­ti­cal option of using the time to allow life to gloss past your eyes and med­i­tate on oth­er Earth­ly mat­ters. Maybe even con­sid­er what oth­er Earth­ly mat­ters are going through the heads of the peo­ple on screen?

Per­haps this is a pes­simistic view of things, but Man­aka­mana feels most enrich­ing as a work about life and death. The peo­ple who sit in these cars are whisked across what looks to be high­ly treach­er­ous (albeit breath­tak­ing) ter­rain with­out the mer­est con­sid­er­a­tion for poten­tial mor­tal­i­ty. Stun­ning beau­ty and fiery death buf­fet against one anoth­er as we humans casu­al­ly slip between the tiny slith­er of space that parts them. Man­aka­mana itself is a tem­ple which sits at the top of this line, and so the metaphor feels extend­ed to one of life, death and transcendence.