Carlos Reygadas
Stellet Licht

THE REVIEW

Carlos Reygadas is one of the leading figures of the new Mexican auteur cinema. Often defined as a capable author, but hampered by clumsy attempts at provocation (reminiscent of the scandal caused at Cannes by his second feature film "Battle in Heaven"), he is, in reality, a complex, extremely fascinating gaze, and above all, full of personal visual power.
From the raw and good debut "Japòn" (2002), through the flabby bodies of the poorly successful "Battle in Heaven" (2005) and the profound beauty of "Stellet Licht" (2007), up to the latest, beautiful and cryptic, "Post-Tenebras Lux" (2012), Reygadas' cinema has set itself the goal of studying the carnal impulse of the human being in a fascinating and beautiful, yet threatening and fatal nature. A cinema that, despite the declared infatuation for Tarkovsky and Dreyer, managed to develop an original and surprising way of observing the world.

The drive that his eye wants to show us was blatantly presented in front of the camera in the previous film, while in "Stellet Licht" (silent light) it is whispered, immersed as it is in a continuous breath that denies every attempt at transgression. 
The film lasts almost two hours and twenty minutes, and it seems impossible to imagine such a physical length for a plot that, directed by others, wouldn't have surpassed a twenty-minute short film.
On the other hand, the narrative line that the film follows is: Johan, a man married to the icy Esther from whom he has generated seven children, falls madly (and uncontrollably) in love with another woman, Marianne. The man, loving two women simultaneously, experiences a state of emotional crisis that collapses when Esther is unexpectedly struck down by a heart attack. 

This simple, minimal tale is lived within a community of Mennonites who, similar to the Amish but not so radical (they accept the use of automobiles and advancements in medicine), force themselves to live in the past, in a purity that denigrates mass communication means (television, phone, internet...) and strengthens itself in family values and devotion to God. An atypical community that mainly inhabits northern Mexico, where a language also identifies them, Plautdietsch (a sort of German with Flemish influences) which also gives the title to the work. 

In "Stellet Licht" Reygadas takes his time and doesn't feel the need to cut where it's not necessary: the images expand, becoming even hypnotic, but without ever falling into pretentiousness or boredom. 
His images are aseptic, yet enveloping, never sterile, capable of striking deeply and remaining impressed. Images that themselves are also characters, living beings, composing an overall picture able to eviscerate the presumed Malickian aesthetic. 
Powerful and visionary, "Stellet Licht" annihilates in space and time.

A minimalist film that opens and closes with scenes of admirable visionary beauty (a sunrise and a sunset, silent lights framing rigid yet fragile and aseptic lives), where the concentration, more than on Johan, revolves around the two main female figures, so similar in physical appearance yet opposite in soul. Marianne is passionate beneath the rigidity and rigor imposed by the community, while Esther is the devoted and passive wife who endures her husband's blatant betrayal in silence. All the other characters are background and do not contribute to the progression of the narration, drowned in images of extraordinary aesthetic beauty (functional to the story for once) and which lives, breathes, and moves above all in the description of natural environments (particularly splendid the scene of the children immersed in water), a majestic and immortal nature in front of human smallness. 

Human smallness helpless in front of divine silence, especially when examining characters of enormous faith: Does God exist? Is God there for us? Does God take at His pleasure or are His punishments considered to improve the lives of the living? What is certain is only doubt: there are no answers. 
God increases the sense of guilt, evident in the wonderful and disorienting funeral vigil, where each child is framed in close-up waiting for something that doesn't happen. 
And here comes the miracle: Marianne and Johan, victims of loss and emptiness, embrace for the last time with sweetness. She obscures the light with her hand: it doesn't matter whether God exists or not. It is man's task to generate life through repentance. Marianne removes herself from Johan's life, restoring family balance, she who had disintegrated it by chasing love. 
The true act of love lies in bringing Esther back to life with a kiss: a scene that recalls Dreyer and his cornerstone "Ordet - The Word" (1955) and lives with luminous ambiguity. Is the return to life physical or mental?
The woman remains trapped in her coffin, prisoner of time (continuously marked by an asphyxiating pendulum): she smiles, speaks, but does not reach the others. Does she really come back to life or has she simply accepted what caused her to wither so quickly?
Fortunately, there is no answer, and the incredible ambiguity that arises is a gentle and shocking caress.

And so here we are, faced once again with a new light: a sunset that mirrors that initial sunrise, tinting with night, stars, and silence. 
Balance is achieved.
Shall we go in peace?
Amen.