Virtually without dialogue, the debut film by Eugenio Polgovsky (1977–2017) shows how a group of people survive in the desert of the Mexican state of San Luis Potosí. In this bone-dry region, they use traps and snares to catch birds, snakes, and rodents.
Everyone, young and old, takes part in the hunt. Some of the animals they catch are eaten; others, including songbirds, are sold along Highway 57, the 1,300-kilometer road linking Mexico and the United States, as are the cacti they dig up. “Living is hard work,” an elderly woman remarks in one of the film’s rare moments of speech.
The film, which won the Joris Ivens Award at the Cinéma du Réel documentary festival in Paris in 2005, is an indictment of the forgotten poverty in which these people live, but also a tribute to their resilience. The dynamic images draw the viewer into a sense of wonder at their extraordinary vitality and resourcefulness. At some points, organ music lends their struggle for survival an almost spiritual dimension.
Stills
