Los Reyes, the eighth collaboration by the established Chilean directorial duo Bettina Perut and Iván Osnovikoff (The Death of Pinochet, Surire) and winner of the runner-up Special Jury Award at the last edition of the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA), is set in the oldest skate park in the Chilean capital of Santiago. Perut and Osnovikoff’s improbably story is about the real kings here: Fútbol and Chola, two stray dogs who have made their home in this open space full of hurtling skateboards and rowdy teenagers.
The energetic Chola loves to play with the balls she finds lying around, positioning and catching them near where the skaters show off their tricks. The older dog, Fútbol, ooks on impatiently and barks at Chola until she finally lets a ball drop. The teenagers around them come from very different, sometimes troubled, backgrounds. They each have their own story, which they recount in voiceovers. In this almost fairy-tale-like film, the phenomenal, dreamy camerawork centers almost entirely on the subtle interactions between the two dogs as they play with a ball, a stick, a stone and each other.
Radical and witty, the documentary film is an exciting and unusual cinematic portrait of a place and a society with two improbable protagonists. Executive produced by acclaimed Chilean filmmaker Maite Alberdi (The Grown-Ups, Tea Time), Los Reyes puts the international spotlight on Perut and Osnovikoff, who are leaving an indelible mark on Chilean and Latin American documentary cinema.
LOS REYES
A film by Bettina Perut and Iván Osnovikoff
(Chile/Germany, 2018, 77 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
Now streaming on iTunes
Watch the trailer:
