Films & Events
La Ciénaga
A group of inebriated middle-aged people lies beside a fetid, stagnant swimming pool. As a storm approaches, the people slowly rise to shuffle inside, carrying their drinks and dragging their lounge chairs noisily behind them. One woman falls, cutting herself deeply, but no one rushes to her aid. This unnerving opening scene of Lucrecia Martel’s 2001 debut sets the languid tone for a story about two branches of an alcohol-ravaged, bourgeois Argentine family that has gone to seed along with their decaying estate. The victim of the fall is Mecha, the family matriarch, who calls for her son, José, and his family to return from Buenos Aires while she recuperates. Joining them are Mecha’s cousin, Tati, and her brood of kids who run unsupervised around the estate. The humid, sticky air of the setting (the word ciénaga is Spanish for “swamp”) seeps into every scene of the film and adds to the overall feeling of malaise. Rather than concoct a plot, Marcel stitches together a series of disconnected vignettes to illustrate the family’s dissolution. First seen in Seattle at the 2002 Women in Cinema Film Festival, La Ciénaga is a powerful document of a wealthy family—and, indirectly, Argentina’s middle class—being swallowed up by neglect and dysfunction.
Sponsor:
Comcast
Cast & Crew
Director: Lucrecia Martel
Producer: Lita Stantic
Editor: Santiago Ricci
Screenwriter: Lucrecia Martel
Cinematographer: Hugo Colace
Principal Cast: Mercedes Morán, Graciela Borges, Martín Adjemían, Leonora Balcarce
Filmography: The Headless Woman (2008); The Holy Girl (2004)
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(1 review)
user reviews
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Direction sublime. Storytelling subpar., Jun 01, 2009
By J Daniel Scott
“Luecretia Martel is an awesome talent. I love the leisurely pace of her artfully staged scenes in both films I've seen (The Headless Woman is the other). But what talent she has with directing she lacks in storytelling. La Cienaga is tale of a family of rich people who spend a leisurely, wine”
… full review
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