Films > Film Reviews

Embrace of the Serpent

06/07/16

The first Columbian film to be nominated for a Best Foreign Language Oscar, Embrace of the Serpent is a monochrome journey to spirituality. Two narratives interweave, linked by the Amazonian shaman Karamakate and two scientists separated by 40 years, both seeking a rare wild flower. 

We experience undertones of Apocalypse Now (Theo's skeletal head in the firelight and Brando's hellish ramblings) and hints of colonialism. Instead of the white man’s perspective Karamakate is the true protagonist; he is the last of his people and we see the jungle's evolution through his eyes. These kinds of films generally carry with them a threat of invasion from western culture, but here it’s the scientists themselves who are in danger of being swallowed by shamanic ritual, the thickly-growing trees of a completely alien jungle, the bizarre and entertaining drug hallucination sequences. They stumble upon a tribe of children forcibly Christianised by a missionary priest, but their worship is broken up, the children scattered.

The film’s treatment of the inheritance and exchange of knowledge is also interesting. Theo refuses to leave behind his compass at a camp because he believes that the peoples’ tradition of celestial navigation will eventually be forgotten; to preserve their culture he must keep them from any kind of advanced technology. At the same time the white man’s reliance on his material possessions is inconceivable to the shaman. Why choose to lug around these crates and trunks when what they carry is ultimately useless for a fulfilling life? 

This review sounds like an English essay because it’s difficult to put into words exactly what this film is doing. Embrace of the Serpent is a quest film, a surreal mixture of Jarmusch's Dead Man (white man out of his depth in a land that he does not own) and Herzog's Aguirre the Wrath of God, in which the Amazon river is the serpent is the road is the mind. Very impressive and equally immersive, it’s the third feature from Columbian director Chiro Guerra; we’ll need to keep an eye on him because he seems to know something we don’t.

8/10