And now I arrive at the countries that forced me to do more work than what I had initially thought was necessary. Had I done some deeper research at the beginning of this project I might have discovered that Ecuador managed to qualify for three World Cups in the 21st century, which likely would’ve prodded me to search for some Ecuadorian films to consider. Instead I only considered their 2018 results where they finished 8th in the CONMEBOL qualifiers which led me to think that I didn’t need to worry about them. As a result of this I got caught a bit off guard, which honestly was probably overdue to happen.
Ecuador has a modest film culture where documentaries tend to be particularly popular, although there has been a steady increase in the number of fictional features and productions as a whole in recent years. Despite this growth, international distribution still tends to be hit or miss. Take for instance the work of Sebastián Cordero. His 2009 film Rabia got picked up for US distribution by Strand Releasing and is still relatively easy to find. His subsequent film Pescador (which for what it’s worth, has a slightly higher rating on IMDB) failed to secure US distribution and is impossible to find in the States unless you can find an import copy. I have serendipitously discovered that university libraries here in the US are great places to find foreign imports, but beyond this I’m still not quite sure where to look.
As for Tania Hermida’s debut feature it was shown at the AFI Fest in Los Angeles back in 2006. Outside of this festival it’s never been showed anywhere else in the US apart from local, low profile events, like say this particular screening arranged by a professor at Indiana State University. The home media distribution rights were secured by a company then known as Venevision International, who specialize in Latin American content. To my knowledge Venevision hasn’t done much to make this title available for streaming, so DVDs are going to be the better option here. As always there may be ‘unofficial’ streams available online, but you’re on your own for that. According to worldcat.org there were roughly 80 holdings total in the US, with 1 copy being held at a public library within 20 miles of where I live. Within 40 miles there were two additional libraries holding a copy. Of course I’m at the stage of this project where I can’t even check these titles out which forces me to watch the films within a library itself. This project is quickly becoming a dichotomous journey where visually I’m witnessing the grandeur and vastness of the world and yet concretely I’m conducting a modest visiting tour of suburban Chicago libraries.
In spite of this I’ll spare you my thoughts about the Aurora Public Library. As for the film itself the cinematography caught my eye early on with a clear intent to capture the natural beauty of Ecuador. This could be seen even before the proper journey began. A short scene between Esperanza and a local taxi cab driver was cast against a mountain, as was a shot of Tristeza sitting in the back of a university classroom. The mountains would continue to feature in the film and would take on a quasi-mystical quality given their near constant presence in watching over the characters. An extremely well framed shot of a lone mountain seen when the two leads were waiting to hitch a ride stood out due to its vividness, as did the walking shots of the two main characters cast against a multicolored hillside. Such imagery would delight the woman who travelled as “Hope”, a Spanish travel agent who had come to the country in order capture pictures to entice foreign visitors. And yet there were times when the cinematography would show favor with the woman who travelled as “Sadness” a youthful college student who preferred for Hope to simply capture Ecuador as it is, with no editorial filter. An early scene of Tristeza sitting at a bus station was just as beautifully framed and shot as the film’s outdoor scenes which may up serving as a better testament to the quality of the camerawork in the film. Regardless of how easy it would be for one to delight viewers with the National Geographic splendor of the countryside, the framing throughout the film was excellent and the use of motion was incredibly graceful. If the shot of the multicolored hillside wasn’t enough, the subsequent horizontal pan shot of the farmland added to the wonderful imagery of the film.
But the camerawork also contained some thematic depth and really aided in telling the story. The speed of the early pan shot of Tristeza walking through the library accentuated the growing intensity of the character’s emotional insecurity. I was also amazed by the pull back shot of the two women as the news reporters left them, which showed the characters receding deeper into the wilderness that surrounded them. Given how well both were staged against the terrain behind them, this pull back shot was pure art. The mise-en-scène was also noteworthy. During a brief stop in Alausí, a shot of the three travelers appeared to confirm their status as perfect strangers who lacked even a casual friendly familiarity given the conspicuous distance at which they sat apart from each other. This served as a good contrast to the intimacy of the shots when the three are sitting down for a meal. Here there was a subtle brilliance to the shot of Sadness, who as the subject of the conversation, was staged in the center while the other two characters spoke from the edges of the frame. The editing also showed some flair with the use of a quick series of discontinuous jump cuts while Tristeza was on the phone which effectively conveyed the confusion and chaotic volatility of her emotional turmoil. This tactic was used again later in the film to once again mirror the sharp disconnected thoughts that are capable of producing some inner conflict. I generally liked this particular aspect of the editing and thought it was used appropriately without significantly annoying the viewer. The one complaint that I do have about the cinematography would be its very leisurely pace. This was a film that seemed longer than its running time, and given the urgency in some of the personal narratives, the pace often felt inappropriately slow.
The personal narratives themselves only brought a modest amount of intrigue to the film. Ultimately it didn’t seem like they mattered all that much as Qué tan lejos conformed to the traditional trappings of a road movie. Like many other films from this genre, it was structured as a series of short, dramatic episodic vignettes staged at various way-stations that brought the characters progressively closer to their predetermined fate. Within this structure I pondered the significance of the actual act of traveling. Perhaps what really matters in such films is not the motion of people through space but rather the moments that occur between such movements. Often the greater focus is placed on the relationships that get built, the stories that become intertwined, the complications and dramas that unfold as people venture into unfamiliar terrain. The filmmakers clearly understood that it is these transient, chaotic, casual connections that make such stories interesting. And while many can moan about how cliché road movies have become due to how often they appear in film cultures, this particular trope still possesses a boundless potential in its ability to go in unexpected directions. One will watch this film and constantly know that the characters are headed towards Cuenca, but one can never feel completely sure about how they’ll get there or what will happen to them along the way. With regards to this latter point, I thought the character development was good, which typically is a sign of a successful road movie. This aspect was especially strong for Sadness, who was the youngest and most unstable of all the characters in the story. What the filmmakers crafted was less a journey through a physical reality, but more of a transformative experience that broadened the character and soul of those who dared to embark on it. Within this mindset having the characters reach their destination was only important in that it brought this developmental process to a close.
Still though the narrative was plagued by interesting concepts that felt underdeveloped, like the early philosophical bent whenever one saw characters read during the story. It was also hampered by its artificial devices. The unexpected turns in the narrative were for the most part driven by an indigenous revolt that was never truly seen and which held a ghostly presence in the film. The film also relied on the exposition of seemingly pointless trivia when one first met all of the important characters. I never regarded this information as being particularly relevant and much of it was quickly forgotten. Even at the end of the film, the real names of the female characters had escaped me. I left this film with memories of two women who travelled as Hope and Sadness. And to be fair it was hard to avoid this impression, given the one crucial scene where both performers wholly embraced such monikers.
As for the acting there were glimpses of its largely concealed quality, but ultimately in the end there was nothing that ever truly grabbed one’s attention. If anything the subtle, physical acting was often excellent. For instance in the scene where Andrés revealed his backstory, the other performers were brilliant in conveying the awkwardness of already knowing more about his friend’s wedding. The somber countenances here were actually quite striking.
Tania Martinez, as Hope, was especially good in this capacity. During a brief scene between Hope and Sadness while on the bus, Martinez gave Sadness a wonderfully odd glance after she started to read one of her books. Overall Martinez played her character as a somewhat dorky, yet friendly, if not awkward foreigner whose outgoing, cheerful demeanor was a wonderful compliment to the other characters in the film. She certainly stood out as a stark contrast to Cecilia Vallejo who played Sadness as a more reflective, reserved and aloof character. There was some modest tension between these two characters early in the film due to how both actresses played their roles which felt genuine even if it never developed into anything significant. Vallejo though ultimately got tasked with providing much of the film’s emotional intensity which she did ably. I thought Vallejo perfectly portrayed the gradual increase in anger and resentment during her phone call. She also reacted beautifully to Andrés’ information about the wedding and in a later scene did a great job of expressing the torment of finding out that she was merely a bit player in someone else’s life; a dynamic that felt like the complete antithesis of what was presented in the film. Beyond this there though were small nuances in her performance that she handled well, like her insistence on correcting Andres’s pronunciation of Zhud, which efficiently offered greater insight into the character.
It was these kinds of touches that I felt were a bit lacking elsewhere in the film especially with Pancho Aguirre’s performance as Jesús. While I could enjoy the good-nature humor of what Aguirre did here, overall his performance felt stale and forgettable. He simply didn’t craft an interesting or compelling personality for Jesús. In most scenes he achieved little presence especially given that the other characters in the film were already more engaging with some of them getting the additional benefit of extra screen time to forge a connection with the viewer. Fausto Mino, as Andrés, on the other hand made the most of his scant screen time. Between his spiriting singing or his ridiculously inane celebration of a football goal, he easily came off as an interesting character whose presence couldn’t be ignored. Furthermore Ricardo González as Iguana only got one drunken monologue on a beach to add some charm to the film and yet did so convincingly.
Overall this was an incredibly well shot film, that contained off some good acting talent, but which seemed a bit unfocused and unsure of itself in a narrative sense. This alone though would not offer enough reason to dismiss the film entirely. There’s still enough quality here to make it enjoyable to watch.