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08/14/2023

Review 'Memento Mori': Crossing the Boundaries Between Tragedy and Dark Humor?


By Daniel Ruiz, (Twitter: @tatoruiz), accredited by CineVista at the Lima Film Festival.

The debut film by Colombian director Fernando López Cardona begins with some quite well-executed shots. A highly aesthetic gamble. In the midst of a bucolic rural landscape in Antioquia, the earth begins to split open. A man emerges from the underground, and the reference couldn't be more unsettling. Likewise, it's impossible not to think of a reference like "Night of the living dead," not out of stubbornness, but because the forms stimulate it. A conflicting situation, as we are supposed to be facing a rather solemn film, much like its theme: the memory of the victims of the Colombian armed conflict.

And yes, "Memento mori" is a sort of tribute to the victims, to that event that affects all Colombians in various ways. It's a proposal that seeks to join a filmography that is constantly trying to preserve memory through the stories of war and its countless victims. López Cardona presents a new memorial for the disappeared, and that is perhaps the most valuable and important aspect of the film, although as a cinematic work – disregarding technical and aesthetic skills – it's uneven. Clumsy.

"Memento mori" tells the story of an "animero" (a character that mediates between the living and the dead) in the Antioquia region at the turn of the millennium, when the country's armed conflict was still deeply entrenched and lifeless bodies were being carried away by the Magdalena River. Bodies that were received by strangers in Puerto Berrío, Antioquia, and were given burials with the label N.N., while prayers were said for their souls. The most recent victim is a young decapitated man, and in response, the animero's goal is to find his head and return it as part of the dignity that the deceased person deserves.

Added to this narrative is the story of Naré, a nurse who seeks the truth about her husband's disappearance and turns to the animero, who in turn discovers that the missing husband and the decapitated man might be connected.

The dramatic event caused by the confluence between the world of the living and the dead, the setting of "Memento mori," doesn't solely unfold through the protagonist and his role (the animero). Fernando López extends this duality to a narrative with two main characters, each with different – albeit sometimes complementary – objectives. And it's precisely this intention to narrate through two characters that ends up entangling the nearly two-hour-long story.

In the end, amidst the confusion and unease, I can't help but wonder, although I'm convinced it's not the case, whether "Memento mori" is constantly blurring the lines between tragedy and dark humor.

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