Monday, March 12, 2012

Nuestro Cine: A Bonsai Grows in Miami

The Miami International Film Festival was held this month and an entry from Chile captured the festival’s top award.
Bonsái examines the life of an author named Julio whose awkwardness is shown as a university student and as a young man. Julio reflects upon his past experiences with loneliness, lost love and unfulfilled goals in order to complete his next novel.

The film also provides a glimpse into Julio’s future though as noted in an article in indiwire.com, “one of Bonsái's many minor miracles is how that foreknowledge quickly becomes less relevant than the smaller moments and details leading up to that known end.”

The title of the film comes from Julio’s taking care of a bonsai tree, which he compares to his writing. “More than anything else, it seems to mirror the stunted growth of his two relationships,” according to an article from The Hollywood Reporter.

Bonsái is adapted from a novel of the same name by Alejandro Zamba, though the film’s director pointed out that the movie is more than just a simple adaptation:
(Cristián) Jiménez explained recently in an interview with EFE that “Bonsái” is…a work whose theme is a literary gesture” and one where books “play a role that go far beyond its content.”

The movie, which has been screened in festivals including Cannes, Toronto and San Sebastián, is "the existential dimension of loneliness and its characters, who face this situation refuge in books," according to its director.
Below is the long version of the trailer for Bonsái that includes English-language subtitles and is slightly Not Safe for Work:
http://youtu.be/37s_CUwcwuc

Other films from Latin American and the Caribbean received honors at the ten-day film fest including Cuban horror/satire Juan of the Dead and Mexican thriller Expiration Date.

Online Sources- La Nacion, indiewire.com, The Hollywood Reporter

Video Sources – YouTube via tiff, proalphatv and CNN

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