Jauja
September 19th, 2019

Courtesy of press kit:

An astonishingly beautiful Western starring Viggo Mortensen, Jauja (pronounced how-ha) begins in a remote outpost in Patagonia during the “Conquest of the Desert” in the late 1800s. Captain Gunnar Dinesen has come from Denmark with his fifteen year-old daughter to take an engineering job with the Argentine army. Being the only female in the area, Ingeborg creates quite a stir among the men. She falls in love with a young soldier, and one night they run away together. When Dinesen realizes what has happened, he decides to venture into enemy territory, against his men’s wishes, to find the young couple. Featuring a superb performance from Mortensen, Jauja is the story of a man’s desperate search for his daughter, a solitary quest that takes him to a place beyond time, where the past vanishes and the future has no meaning.

The Legend:
The Ancient Ones said that ‘Jauja’ was a fabled city of riches and happiness. Many expeditions tried to find this place. With time, the legend grew disproportionately. People were undoubtedly exaggerating, as they usually do. The only thing that is known for certain is that all who tried to find this earthly paradise got lost on the way.

Tidbits:

• Cannes Film Festival – 2014 – Winner: Un Certain Regard
• Toronto International Film Festival – 2014
• New York Film Festival – 2014
• AFI Fest – 2014

Courtesy of press kit:

Director Statement:

A few years back I received an email telling me that a close friend had been assassinated in a land far away from her place of birth. She loved to write and to talk about films, a bit too much at times. In any case, I was strongly disturbed and shocked by what had happened to her and I began to think of this story. Following her advice, I have devoted more space to words here, and to my own desires. Oddly enough, I feel that this film has come to me and taken its unreal form as a way of helping me to grasp the world and the time we live in, how we vanish in order to inexplicably return, in utterly mysterious ways.

Producer Statement:

When my friend from Boedo, the Argentine poet Fabián Casas, told me in 2011 that he was going to collaborate on a movie project with Lisandro Alonso, I was intrigued. I’d briefly spoken with Lisandro in Toronto a few years earlier, and was familiar with his work, having especially liked “Los muertos”. When we met again, on the set of Ana Piterbarg’s “Todos tenemos un plan”, he told me he wanted to shoot a story set in the 19th century on the Argentine frontier. He said he wanted me to play a Dane who is in the country with his fifteen year-old daughter, working for the military during its genocidal war against the aboriginal population.

It took a lot of patience and hard work by a relatively small but fiercely loyal crew to complete Lisandro Alonso’s “Jauja”, and this collaborative experience has been one of the most satisfying I’ve ever been involved in. We have ended up with a movie that is as Danish as it is Argentine; not an easy thing to do! Fabián and I both admire Lisandro’s creative impulses, and have striven to live up to his philosophy of story-telling in our work on “Jauja”. Lisandro’s is a process that constantly seeks distillation, gently but stubbornly insisting on the intrinsic, essential truth of any given moment. It is one thing to want to achieve this sort of “clean” aesthetic, and another to be able to convey it with grace and originality. Directors like Lisandro, who can truly move us with the subtlety and unmistakable authenticity of their story-telling, do not come along very often. I am proud to have been witness to an important creative step forward for this director, and part of the team that produced what surely will be one of the most special viewing experiences at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.

“If tomorrow I have to quit filmmaking, I will. I’m not going to sell my house for a project, that’s for sure. If I have to go back and work on my family’s farm, fine. I don’t have any problem with it. But I would cry a lot.”

Courtesy of Festival Scope:

Born in Buenos Aires in 1975, Lisandro Alonso studied at the Universidad del Cine (FUC)and co-directed in 1995 with Catriel Vildosola his first short film DOS EN LA VERDERA (1995). After working as assistant sound engineer in many short films and a few features and as assistant director of Nicolas Sarquis for his film SOBRE LA TIERRA, he made his first feature film, LA LIBERTAD (2001), which was screened at Cannes (Un Certain Regard). In 2003, he founded 4L, a production company based in Buenos Aires, to produce his own films. LOS MUERTOS (2004), FANTASMA (2006) and his latest feature film JAUJA (2014) were also invited to Cannes.

Filmography:

• Jauja (2014)
• Sin título (Carta para Serra) (2011) (Short)
• Lechuza (2009) (Short)
• Liverpool (2008)
• Fantasma (2006)
• Los Muertos (2004)
• Freedom (2001)
• Dos en la vereda (1995) (Short)

Here is a curated selection of links shared on our Facebook page for additional insight/information:

• 9/11/19 – “Lisandro Alonso’s Jauja should be seen on a big screen or not at all” Ben Sachs, Chicago Reader – link
• 9/18/19 – “There’s a scene in The Knick where characters are blown away watching The Big Swallow in a kinetoscope. That’s what I feel like watching Jauja—like I’m looking through a window into some mythic realm so unfamiliar it’s spooky. The corners are rounded, the colors are yellowed, the exotic landscape is hiding all kinds of secrets.” Brandon Nowalk, The A.V. Club – link