Mexican director Ernesto Contreras’s Sundance award-winner follows university researcher Martín (Fernando Álvarez Rebeil), who travels to a remote village to record and register Zikril, an indigenous language in danger of extinction. Martin discovers that only two Zikril speakers survive, and there is a significant problem: Isauro (José Manuel Poncelis) and Evaristo (Eligio Meléndez) are elderly men who had a falling out over a woman nearly 50 years ago and have refused to speak to each other ever since. Flashbacks detail the circumstances that led to the dissolution of the men’s friendship, and there is a subplot regarding a budding romance between Martin and Evaristo’s granddaughter (Fátima Molina), who teaches an English instructional show on a local radio station. I Dream in Another Language deals with heady themes, from the ephemeral state of culture, to the lingering wounds of betrayal, to the power of language (even a dying tongue). And while the romantic elements—especially Martin’s unlikely foray into affairs of the heart—are sometimes clumsy, the strong performances by Poncelis and Meléndez as old foes (coupled with the beautiful cinematography by Tonatiuh Martínez) more than compensate. Recommended. (P. Hall)
I Dream in Another Language
FilmRise, 101 min., in Spanish w/English subtitles, not rated, DVD: $19.95, Blu-ray: $24.95 Volume 33, Issue 5
I Dream in Another Language
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