Film Info
El árbol

Film Information

Exhibition Title	El árbol
English Title	The Tree
Director	Gustavo Fontán
Country
Year	2007
Format	35 mm
Colour	Color
Duration	65'

Cast:

Julio Fontán, María Merlino

Credits:

G: Gustavo Fontán
F: Diego Poleri
E: Marcos Pastor
S: Javier Farina
PE: Stella Maris Czerniakiewicz
CP: Tercera Orilla, INCAA

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Synopsis

The acacia standing in front of the house is in danger. The father tries to save it, while the mother believes the attempt is of no use. Shot by Fontán in the house where he was born and featuring his own parents, The Tree is much more than a tree: the whispering of leaves, the light and shadow of the foliage, and that sap which decides whether life ends or continues express cinema itself, its state of risk and its subsistence. There is matter and time, memory and fragility, the images and what is invisible behind or inside them. No other film in Argentine cinema operates so delicately on the empty spaces between subtle movements and the waiting before an event. The Tree was made with the patience of a thorough goldsmith and a tenacious gardener, and it shapes a spectator reluctant to be hurried up. At the beginning of the trilogy of light that would later be continued by April Elegy and The House, Fontán re-launches the powers of cinema in that initial state of contact between the camera, what is set in front of it, and its mysterious restitution to the screen. But that doesn’t mean he’s betting on the primitive; he’s making a refined tribute to a long legacy so –like in that old tree– the vital sap of cinema keeps flowing in its second century.

EAR