1:49 MIN.
(Piece belonging to the DVD La Cosa Nuestra(Our thing))
Human death in the shape of a feast; let the horn in and the music begin… Who said that the revenge of the bull could not be fun?
Synopsis:
La Cosa Nuestra is a journey to the most hidden and surrealist side of the bovid-taurean universe. Enjoyment and tremendousness, operating in the iconographic cannibalism.
This video-creation shows other interpretations of the national feast; it brings the Spanish taurean culture face to face with the concepts and the meaning of the figure of the bull and other bovids in different civilisations.
Project:
A series of video-creations, sessions of live video, public interventions and proposal of collaborative practices for various cultural collectives (in the process of finding sponsors).
Review:
This highly interesting compilation of material explores and creates a visual space that emphasises the idea of the bull as cultural axis. Based on a series of pieces, charged with a vitriolic sense of humour, Cañas explores the relationships established between the bull, other bovids and man in different cultural manifestations.
Sci-fi surrealism and olé! in a series of video-creations where sources like the festive spirit of The Pogues, the tremendousness of Goya and Gutiérrez Solana, the poetic fatalism of Bataille, the taurean passion of Orson Welles, the erotic perversion of fanatic pop fans constantly cheering butted bullfighters, other freaky uses of the bull in different cultures like inebriated and massaged caribous in Korea or Hawaiian rhythms in the test of bravery of young males… all come together.
With all this, Cañas explores again the different relationships established between animals and humans, seeing how these are complex, strange and, in some cases, beastly.
La Cosa Nuestra goes beyond the evident; the images that society generates are saturated with symbols, visions, tributes, offering other interpretation registers and new insinuations to the spectator… the strange combination of enjoyment and tremendousness that surrounds us.
This no doubt represents one of Cañas’ best works, which consolidates her in this gender (the scratch-documentary) that she dominates so well.
This work is made up of 5 series, whose narrative structure allows the pieces to be seen separately or as a unit.
Intentions and motivations:
This project does not seek to understand or to explain the essence of the taurean passion-tradition, or to start a series of controversies or hen-fight between enthusiasts and professionals of tauromachy, but to re-contextualise the meaning of the national feast: all its perverse eroticism, poetic fatalism and the interests generated around it. La Cosa Nuestra submerges into the aesthetic, ritual, cultural and social universe of the world of bulls, reconstructing it with criticism but, at the same time, with a healthy irony.
Technical data sheet:
Title: La Cosa Nuestra.
Direction and script: María Cañas.
Editing: Guillermo García
Editing and co-direction The Toro´s Revenge: Samuel Arquellada.
Voice-overs: Luis Gordo.
Production: María Cañas. Ayuda a la Creación Audiovisual Andaluza del Premio RTVA-Zemos98-Caja San Fernando.
Length: 15:33 min. full version.
Production year: 2006.
Original language: Spanish. English subtitles.
Master: MiniDV.
Formats: DVCam/DVD.
