Patricio Guzman And Traumatic Memory

Some of the most profound and powerful documentaries have come from traumatised communities telling stories of heartbreak, loss and devastating experiences. The documentary format has become an in integral part in telling these communities stories and aiding in the process of moving on.

Patricio Guzman, known for his political documentaries ‘The battle of Chile’ and ‘The Pinochet Case’ travels to the Atacama Desert 10,000 feet above sea level for his film Nostalgia for the light. The radiant sky above attracts astronomers from around the globe peering into the outer reaches of the universe, but the Atacama holds a darker and much more sinister secret. The incredible heat of the desert has preserved political prisoners who “disappeared” after

Beadins thesis The Aesthetics of Translating Cultural Trauma: Traumatized Communities in Twentieth-century fiction and film, raise the theory that history is a closed book, and that a person who has been exposed to a traumatic event has been “Frozen” in ones thinking. “Bessel Van Der Kolk and Onno Van Der Hart note that traumatic memories are frozen and the traumatized person is unable to introduce creativity or flexibility into the memory; they distinguish between narrative memory in which a person can tell a story of his or her past adaptively and flexibly, and traumatic memory, in which memories are inflexible and invariable”. Art and cinema hence becomes an incredibly important aspect in traumatized communities. “This ethical act of imagination is crucial if we are very going to escape history’s claim on us.” The imagination and creativity of filmmakers and in particular to the question documentary filmmakers enables communities and those around them to shed histories firm grasp and allows them to witness a different side to a story ravaged by trauma. The failure to be able to infuse imagination and creativity to a communities past struggles and trauma will confine them to a cycle of pained memories, here lies documentary’s greatest strength. ‘A story of a community that can never be freed from the same interpretation of its past is a community that will never change because it has allowed its history to become a prophecy of what it always will be”. With this in mind Guzman’s Nostalgia for the light becomes even more powerful. The beautiful expansions of the universe juxtaposed with the heartbreak and trauma of regimes gone by in the form of loved ones encapsulated in the heat and beauty of the Atacama desert, being found and located by relatives offers up a reminder off the pain and suffering but also offers up a sense of closure and an empathy that rounds out Guzman’s pained and traumatic series of films concerning