Introduced by Dr Rebecca Jarman, University of Leeds, on Sun 15 Mar.
Film details
In a stone hut, over 5000m high in the snow-capped Peruvian Andes, the elderly Phaxsi and her husband Willka eke out a living far from the modern world. The 96 perfectly framed scenes flow gently like still life paintings, depicting the couple, their animals, and their magnificent mountain homeland. In traditional Aymara rituals they beseech Pachamama, Mother Earth, to provide them with sustenance, and to return the long-lost son who has abandoned them for the city, but the struggle to survive eventually prompts a dangerous mission for help.
In this stunning and heart-breaking story about abandonment of the elderly and of traditions, Willka is played by the director’s real life grandfather, and Phaxsi by a non-professional who had never seen a film before.
