Cinema
Chircales
Synopsis
On the outskirts of Bogotá, the Castañeda family makes bricks by hand on land that does not belong to them. The father, the mother and their eleven children knead the clay, mould it, fire it, and live on what the owner is willing to leave them. The children work as soon as they can stand. The camera stays with them for years, and the commentary is made of their own words, recorded and then edited.
Context
Filmed between 1966 and 1972, edited and released in 1972: six years spent with the same family, which was new. The method comes from the French ethnographers with whom the filmmaker had trained, and from the participant observation of sociologists: borrowed cameras, equipment and tape recorders, and the family involved in the making of the film. A first version was shown as early as 1968 at a Latin American film meeting in Venezuela, where it made a great impression; postproduction was completed with the money from a prize. The film was restored in 2014 by the Arsenal in Berlin.
Who it is for
Forty-two minutes in black and white, in Spanish. A documentary without music or external voice; it asks for a little patience at the start.
Prizes and reception
Golden Dove at Leipzig in 1972, international critics' prize, grand prize at Tampere in 1973; five European television channels bought the rights.