Lake Tahoe

As the film begins, we see a car smashed into a pole.  Juan, a young lad somewhere in his mid-to-late teens, emerges.  We don’t know how or why he crashed, it’s a straight road on a clear day with no other traffic.  Juan goes hiking in search of help.  In time, we learn that something weighs heavily on Juan’s mind.

A tightly-controlled, contemplative study of grief, Eimbcke’s follow-up to the lively and lovely Duck Season is a far more controlled affair.  Information is doled out at a snail’s pace, keeping the film’s meanings as obscure as its title.  Juan (Diego Cataño, returning from his excellent work in the previous film) slowly travels from one edge of the widescreen frame to the other, giving the viewer plenty of time to absorb of the sparse scenery of the small Yucatan town and its surroundings.  Along the way, he encounters Don Heber, an elderly mechanic (Hector Herrera) and his dog; David, a kung fu-crazed auto parts dealer (Juan Carlos Lara II); and David’s co-worker Lucia (Daniela Valentine), a young mother looking for a babysitter so she can attend a rock concert.  As in Duck Season, these people form a kind of ad hoc support system, providing Juan with opportunities to participate in a give-and-take process, as well as an outlet for his deeply pent up emotions.

Eimbcke once again utilizes quick black-outs to signify the passage of time without many hints as to how much time has passed.  The space of any given black-out could be 20 seconds, it could be an hour.  It is essentially disregarding time, it becomes a non-issue.  This could be an interesting facet, if Eimbcke was more particular about which stretches of time he deems important.  I generally enjoy a meditative pace, but here it often feels like a perfunctory choice, a decision to make a slow movie just because.  But I wouldn’t say it particularly bothered me, the film is still quite short, although I think these deliberately measured, silent moments often don’t add much to the experience.

The film looks nice, though, and features fine performances.  Lara is especially fun and memorable, and the others carry a degree of pathos without getting at all maudlin.  There are some excellent moments throughout, moments that feel more weighted in retrospect.  Do the dead spaces in between intensify the impact of those moments?  Sometimes yes, sometimes no.  Rating: Good

IMDb