An Evening with Juan Daniel F Molero: Reminiscencias (Reminiscences) – Philadelphia Premiere
An Evening with Juan Daniel F Molero
Reminiscencias (Reminiscences) – Philadelphia Premiere
dir. Juan Daniel F Molero, Peru, 2010, digital video, 84 mins, color, Spanish w/ English subtitles
Reminiscencias explores identity, autobiography, and the creation and loss of memory. A young man suffering from amnesia uses 8mm home movies and videos from his cell phone to puzzle out his own history. Is this dramatic process reality, or is it a canny fiction? Followed by a discussion with director Juan Daniel Molero.
Cinema as a neurological rehabilitation treatment? A lot has been written about the connection that exists between film and memory, mostly with a philosophical approach, but it is very unlikely that the first could achieve concrete results against a biological problem within the latter. Or at least that was the situation until Juan Daniel finished editing his antidote-film Reminiscencias. Indeed, the Peruvian filmmaker managed to recover from an amnesia condition by watching his own family films and videos – from 8mm footage to cell phone videos – which he later used to make a sort of documentary about his own healing process. Apart from the medical aspect, the most impressive thing about this case is the autonomous force with which these images unite together, a procedure so blunt that it drags Reminiscencias towards the tradition of experimental cinema. And yet it never ceases to be one of the most heartbreaking documentaries about a man’s life and environment. BAFICI – Buenos Aires Festival Internacional de Cine.
