email Join our email list! divider Register Login cartCart
Icarus Film
Films from independent
producers worldwide.
32 Court Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201divider(718) 488 8900
Oblivion
Directed by Heddy Honigmann
 Text Size  Increase Font Size   Decrease Font Size   divider Printable VersionPrintable Version

The latest documentary from Heddy Honigmann (Forever, Metal and Melancholy, O Amor Natural) focuses on Peru's capital city of Lima, revealing its startling contrasts of wealth and poverty, and how many of its poorest citizens have survived decades of economic crisis, terrorism and government violence, denial of workers' rights, and political corruption.

Demonstrating anew Honigmann's extraordinary talent as one of the most empathetic documentary filmmakers at work today, OBLIVION provides intimate and moving portraits of street musicians, singers, vendors, shoeshine boys, and the gymnasts (some mere children) and jugglers who perform at traffic stops. The film also visits with small business owners, from a leather-goods repairman and a presidential sash manufacturer to a frog-juice vendor, and contrasts the work and home environments of bartenders, waiters and waitresses employed at Lima's finest restaurants and hotels but who live in slums in the city's surrounding hillsides.

film still

The moving interviews and reminiscences of these resilient and resourceful Peruvians are interwoven with scenes of contemporary political protests and archival footage of the rogues' gallery of the nation's presidents-Fernando Belaunde (1980-1985), Alan Garcia (1985-1990), Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000)-whose mismanaged or corrupt regimes have turned the majority of Peru's citizens into perennial victims of economic impoverishment and political abuse.

film still

For most viewers, who are reminded of Peru only by news reports of a major earthquake, a presidential election or the discovery of a decades-old mass grave of army massacre victims, OBLIVION introduces us to the everyday reality of Lima, celebrating a people who, albeit politically powerless, have resisted being consigned to oblivion.

"In a deceptively relaxed way she integrates intimate portraits into a telling picture about the hardship of life under a succession of corrupt governments." —International Film Guide

"A masterpiece… you feel a direct, easygoing and warm approach from the director to her characters." —Dox Magazine

"A multilayered cinematic cocktail which reveals a poetical and Chaplinesque vision of the resilience of humanity." —International Film Critics Federation

"Honigmann's film shows us that for those left behind in the wake of neoliberal economic policies, the terror of trying to survive plays out in long, slow periods of waiting for life to get better." —Latin American Perspectives

Mayor's Prize, Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival 2009
International Film Critics FIPRESCI Prize, Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Films 2008
Silver Dove, Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Films 2008
Jury Prize, Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Films 2008
RIDM Documentary Festival in Montreal 2009

93 minutes / Color
Spanish / English subtitles
Release: 2009
Copyright: 2008

For individual consumers (home video)

This title is available online from:

For colleges, universities, government agencies, hospitals and corporations

This DVD is sold with a license for institutional use and Public Performance rights.

Subject areas:
Adolescence, Economic Sociology, Latin America, Latin American Studies, On 35mm, Peru, Politics, Sociology, South America, US & Canadian Broadcast Rights

Related Links:
The Films of Heddy Honigmann

Also available for rental on 35mm, please inquire.

Related Titles:
Home | New | Titles | Subjects | Ordering   
About | Best Sellers | Filmmakers | Screenings   
address
  Follow Us! On...
Facebook Follow Icarus Films on Twitter Instagram Vimeo YouTube
Copyright (c) 2024, Icarus Films
Last Updated January 25, 2024 [Build 3.0.a060-d7]
Privacy Policy