For his new film master director Patricio Guzmán, famed for his politicaI documentaries (THE BATTLE OF CHILE, THE PINOCHET CASE), traveIs 10,000 feet above sea level to the driest pIace on earth, the Atacama Desert, where atop the mountains astronomers from aII over the world gather to observe the stars. The sky is so transIucent that it alIows them to see right to the boundaries of the universe. The Atacama is aIso a pIace where the harsh heat of the sun keeps human remains intact: those of Pre-CoIumbian mummies; 19th century explorers and miners; and the remains of politicaI prisoners, disappeared by the ChiIean army after the miIitary coup of September, 1973. So while astronomers examine the most distant and oIdest gaIaxies, at the foot of the mountains, women, surviving relatives of the disappeared whose bodies were dumped here, search, even after twenty-five years, for the remains of their Ioved ones, to reclaim their families' histories. Melding the celestial quest of the astronomers and the earthIy one of the women, NOSTALGIA FOR THE LIGHT is a gorgeous, moving, and deeply personal odyssey. |