alr

To Kill a Man
(Matar a un hombre)

Directed by Alejandro Fernández Almendras.
With Daniel Candia, Alejandra Yañez, Daniel Antivilo.
Chile/France , 2014, digital video, color, 82 min.
Spanish with English subtitles.
Copy source: Film Movement

Like El Chacal de Nauheltoro to which it plays subtle homage, Alejandro Fernández's rigorously restrained study of violence and justice uses a true story to offer an engaging allegory about the relationship of the state to its citizens. In this case, the hero is a lonely forester tormented by an abusive, bullying neighbor seemingly determined to push him over the edge. To Kill a Man is notable for its detached camera, which uses long sequence shots to give equal focus to the landscapes and cityscapes as to the action that unfolds within them. Fernández makes careful use of slow time both to raise the suspense of his film and to evoke the frustrated waiting for intervention from a bureaucratic and ineffective criminal justice system.

Part of film series

Read more

Remapping Latin American Cinema: Chilean Film/Video 1963 – 2013

Current and upcoming film series

Read more

Música de Câmara. The Cinema of Rita Azevedo Gomes

Read more

From the Harvard Film Archive Collection …

Read more

Chile Año Cero / Chile Year Zero

Read more

People and their Virtue. Two Films by Wang Bing

Read more

Trenque Lauquen by Laura Citarella

Read more

I Heard It Through the Grapevine with James Baldwin

Read more

Filmmaker, Guest Worker: Zelimir Zilnik’s Expatriates

Read more

Adachi Masao’s Revolution+1

Read more

Out of the Ashes – The US-ROK Security Alliance & the Emergence of South Korean Cinema