The Movie Teller

La Contadora de Películas

LONE SCHERFIG
Spain, France, Chile, 2023
116 minutes, Color

In the nitrate salt flats of Chile's Atacama Desert, mine workers have created a community amidst a precarious life in the driest place on Earth. María Margarita, whose mother left her family to pursue the arts, is a gifted performer who transforms herself on stage when she recounts to her family (who can only afford one ticket among them) the pictures she has seen in the town's cinema. Soon she becomes the community's most prominent star. As the "movie teller," she transports her audience to the new worlds she discovers onscreen, enabling them to escape their daily lives. When changing times threaten to erode the community, María continues to breathe life into the people of this unforgiving land, immortalizing their struggles in her stories. The Movie Teller is a celebration of our capacity to defy even the harshest circumstances to find love, inspiration, and hope.—Toronto International Film Festival

In Spanish with English subtitles