Winner of the Golden Shell for Best Film at the 1989 San Sebastián Film Festival and eight years in the making with a cast of hundreds of Aymara people, Jorge Sanjinés powerful film The Secret Nation / La nación clandestina is a profound depiction at power, corruption, resistance and redemption, and a landmark film in Bolivian cinema.
“Set against the turbulent backdrop of a military coup, the film follows Sebastian Maisman (Reynaldo Yujra), who returns to his former Aymara village after life in the city but ultimately disgraces his community by collaborating with the corrupt government and embezzling aid money. As a rite of expiation, he decides to journey to his homeland once more and enact the ancient Jacha Tata Danzanti, a ceremony in which the performer dances himself to death as a sacrificial offering. This series of events is told through a darting, elliptical mode of continuity, inspired by the Aymara’s cyclical notion of time.” —Light Industry
THE SECRET NATION / LA NACIÓN CLANDESTINA
A film by Jorge Sanjinés
(Bolivia/Spain, 119 min. In Aymara and Spanish with English subtitles)
Now streaming on Vimeo
