Review: “The settlers” – DN.se

Has the cinematographer arrived? That’s how it can sometimes feel when a contemporary film occupies the screen with black edges on the sides. In today’s image culture, dominated by the wide views of television and computer monitors and smartphone-adapted material in landscape format, the normal image appears as abnormal. A format for connoisseurs.

So already there, “The settlers” stands out. The Chilean western drama, which takes place at the beginning of the 20th century, shines a light on historical darkness. A motley trio travels through Patagonia at the behest of José Menéndez, a businessman and ruthless landowner who is no stranger to marking territory with blood (as recently as 2008, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission highlighted Menéndez’s real complicity in the annihilation of Tierra del Fuego’s indigenous population).

“The settlers” is not like that as much a history lesson as a nasty depiction of how it might have happened. Thematically, it follows in the footsteps of last year’s “Killers of the flower moon”, but if Scorsese’s epic is a dialogue-driven portrayal of time and place, director Felipe Gálvez Haberle’s feature film debut is a more introverted adventure, where eerily beautiful tableaus are interspersed with recent close-ups.

A Scotsman, an American and a Chilean of mixed origins travel along barren and often deserted stretches. Death is in the air and every encounter with strangers is surrounded by a threatening atmosphere. Arm-wrestling, fishing, rape and scalping are some of the activities that can be seen in pictures and are surpassed in brutality only by the atrocities you hear about.

It belongs to the territory battles of the western genre to pay attention to the environments, which in “The settlers” take on painterly qualities. In the evening scenes, the moon, stars and campfires are used to make the partially silent people resemble wax figures against the sleeping horizon. The aesthetic arrangement creates an unpleasant effect, as if you are taking part in a forbidden exhibition about a darkened past.

The narrow aspect ratio (according to technical data on IMDb in the proportions 1.55:1) can thus be seen as a reminder. Not only about what fits in the image, but perhaps even more importantly: what has been pushed to the dark edges.

Towards the end, a couple is asked to pose for the camera. They are themselves victims, given their roots, but their consciences have been stained by past jobs for the enemy side. So there will be no smiles for the camera, this powerful medium for falsifying collective memories. Instead, their clenched faces hint at the truths that would take a century to shed light on.

History is written by the victor, it is often said – but with time it can also be rewritten. Corrected. Something that “The settlers” does with telling silences and uncomfortable counter-images.

See more. Other notable settler dramas: “The Settlers” (1972), “The New World” (2005), “Meek’s Cutoff” (2010).

Read other film and television reviews in DN and more texts by Sebastian Lindvall.

“The settlers” won the biggest prize at the Stockholm film festival