Series Site
Like all nations, Mexico surfaces from myth. Its most popular myth remains branded on its flag, an iconographic depiction of an eagle eating a snake atop a nopal that dates back to the Aztec decision to settle in Teotihuacán (present-day Mexico City). This symbol of antiquity, woven into the popular imagination of a once-colony, oft-imperialized territory has come to represent everything from indigenous culture to neoliberal threat. This, like the many phantasmic myths that make up Mexico’s character, speak to its syncretic soul — living, deadened, relatable and innominable.
Taking the American carnival of representation edified in Cinco de Mayo as a jumping off point, Spectacle Theater presents a series spotlighting a few, little seen, Mexican films dealing with the mythic, mystic and shamanistic traditions much of the nation’s allure has been constructed around. Both released in 1975, Rolando Klein’s CHAC: THE RAIN GOD and François Reichenbach’s DO YOU HEAR THE DOGS BARKING? stand out as cavalier works of ethno-fiction, refracting indigenous stories through the prism of greater cultural narratives. CHAC concerns a village’s attempts to solve a drought after their local shaman fails them, forcing them to seek assistance with an enigmatic mountain-dwelling diviner. Based on a story by celebrated Mexican author Juan Rulfo, DO YOU HEAR THE DOGS BARKING? tells the parallel stories of a Chamula man seeking medical assistance for his ailing son and the condition of native-peoples in Mexico circa 1960s. A few years later, filmmaker Nicolás Echevarría interviewed internationally acclaimed magic mushroom savant Maria Sabina. The resultant documentary, MARÍA SABINA, MUJER ESPÍRITU collects her wisdom in a series of vignettes. Charles Fairbanks and Saul Kak’s THE MODERN JUNGLE brings a closer examination to the state of shamans today, offering a biting critique of extractive documentary practices and government neglect of indigenous communities in present-day Mexico.