Fantasma

Narcissism is generally regarded as a negative qualification but it can also be a stimulating creative source, as is apparent here. Fantasma has been described as a quickie. Maybe because of its length or because the film maker looks back on his two previous films. You could say the film maker is making up the balance. But you could also say he is taking a new path and saying farewell to his earlier work en passant. He does not look at his earlier films to repeat them, but precisely in order to explore a different space and mood.
So Lisandro Alonso is the maker of La libertad and Los muertos: a minimalist film about a woodcutter, Misael Saavedra, and an equally minimalist film about a murderer, Argentino Vargas. They weren’t actors but men of the land and the forests. Now however they are in the middle of Buenos Aires, in the kind of building they had never entered before. The San Martin Theatre is a cultural temple. It has obviously seen better days but is still a guardian of culture. A disappearing culture, you hear the film maker thinking. The woodcutter and the murderer roam the building and get lost before they find the small Leopoldo Lugones auditorium where Los muertos is to be screened. The camera follows their roaming in supple and lengthy movements.
Without comment or text, Lisandro Alonso makes a plea that transcends his own work. A plea to cherish a certain culture. (GjZ)

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