From a Colombian drug lord building a replica of the mansion from ’80s soap opera Dynasty in the Amazon rainforest, to the filmmaker’s own aunt going through rehab after a suicide attempt, the work of Colombian filmmaker Laura Huertas Millán fuses methods from documentary, ethnography and fiction to create a hybrid hypnotic cinema.
Programme
Laura Huertas Millán: Jeny 303 (2018, 7 mins)
A filmic mistake leads to the accidental composite of two portraits on one film reel: Jeny, a trans woman filmed going through rehab for a heroin addiction, and university building 303, a hot-spot for activism since 1964 now set to be demolished.
Laura Huertas Millán: Sol Negro (2016, 43 mins)
Antonia is an opera singer of uncommon beauty, both lush and sombre. When she ends up in a rehabilitation centre after attempting suicide, all her family ties are irreparably broken. But unlike everyone else, her sister remains deeply affected by what happened. Conflicted family relationships and sorrows emerge little by little; becoming music, auto-ethnography or fiction.
Laura Huertas Millán: El Laberinto (2018, 21 mins)
Floating through the ruins of a drug lord’s mansion deep in the Amazon rainforest, The Labyrinth (El Laberinto) recounts the memories of a narrator who witnessed their spectacular rise and fall. Walking through the forest and the ruins of a narco mansion (an exact replica of the villa from the ‘80s American TV show Dynasty), our narrator will soon become the protagonist of a meandering and hallucinatory account.