Birds of Passage (Pájaros de verano)

Wednesday 2 June at 7.30pm

Cristina Gallego & Ciro Guerra│Colombia│2018│125 mins│M violence, offensive language & sex scenes

An indigenous Colombian family gets involved in a war to control the business of the local drug trade in the burgeoning drug economy of the 1970s.

“A vibrant Colombian indigenous culture that’s survived centuries of colonisation takes on the 1970s drug trade (…). Directors Ciro Guerra and Cristina Gallego shake off the clichés of crime-war and imperialism and imbue their saga with surreal beauty and the elemental power of ancient proverb. The film’s formidable matriarch knows full well that the young chancer who has courted her daughter could only have paid the outrageous dowry she demanded by selling dope to the gringos. But the seed is sown: insisting traditional honour codes be observed in enrichening her clan, she bends her shamanistic authority to building an empire in the desert.” – Bill Gosden, NZIFF 2018