‘Liverpool’: Measured story builds to devastating end

Published 3:28 pm Thursday, November 12, 2009

Travelers to the outlying areas of the movie landscape are discovering the films of Lisandro Alonso, a young director from Argentina. His newest picture, “Liverpool,” provides a challenging but impressive example of his approach.

“Liverpool” is the centerpiece of a tribute to the filmmaker, which Alonso is attending, at the Northwest Film Forum. He will also create a new short film during his stay in the area.

Alonso has said of his oblique style, “My films aren’t narratives. I observe people, different moments, and I put them all together in the film. The audience has to imagine or create something sitting in the chair.”

That’s accurate. “Liverpool” does tell a story, in its own way; but its style is so nonverbal and measured that the viewer is expected to supply motivations and explanations for the actions of the main character — to see into the movie through your own lens.

The film begins on a cargo ship, which is about to dock in southern Argentina. Farrel (played by nonactor Juan Fernandez) has apparently spent most of his adult life at sea, but he asks permission to go ashore and visit his mother.

Much of what follows is Farrel’s journey to a remote area, presumably in search of his mother’s house. He walks across snowy landscapes, hitches rides and drinks a lot of vodka.

One night he almost freezes to death after falling asleep drunk in a shed. But eventually he makes it to his destination, where some unexpected developments — it’s been years since he was home — await.

Alonso is not interested in trumping up drama, so most scenes depict ordinary behavior, played out in real time. The film is vague about its intentions until the final few shots, when you realize what it has been building to.

To meet the movie on its own terms is to find those final moments utterly devastating. The film is open-ended, but the very fact that it requires audiences to meet it halfway is part of the reason it has provoked such an intimate reaction in people who have seen it at film festivals.

The Northwest Film Forum is showing Lisandro Alonso’s three previous features this weekend as well as its regular run of “Liverpool.” The filmmaker is attending the screenings of his movies tonight and Saturday — a rare chance for some background on these risk-taking works.

“Liverpool” ½

A seaman treks across part of Argentina to visit his mother after many years. In director Lisandro Alonso’s measured, nonverbal style, the meanings of this simple narrative are not simple to discern, but for audiences willing to meet the film halfway, the ending proves thoroughly devastating.

In Spanish, with English subtitles.

Rated: Not rated; probably R for nudity, subject matter

Showing: Northwest Film Forum, 1515 12th Ave., Seattle