''The Echo'' ( es, El eco) is a 2023 Mexican-German
docufiction film directed by
Tatiana Huezo
Tatiana Huezo Sánchez (; born 9 January 1972) is a film director of Salvadoran and Mexican nationality, residing in Mexico. Her first film, ' (2011), a documentary about the Salvadoran Civil War, has been awarded internationally. In 2016 she p ...
. The film, which also includes fictional elements, portrays the children of an isolated village "El Echo", in the
Mexican highlands. The film is co-produced by Germany, and was selected to receive its world premiere in the Encounters section of the
73rd Berlin International Film Festival
The 73rd annual Berlin International Film Festival, usually called the Berlinale (), took place from 16 to 26 February 2023. It was the first completely in-person Berlinale since the 70th in 2020. The festival has added a new award for best te ...
, on 17 February 2023.
On December 7, it appeared in the eligible list for consideration of
Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature Film for the
96th Academy Awards
The 96th Academy Awards is an upcoming ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), which will honor the best 2023 in film, films of 2023, and is expected to take place at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Los Ange ...
.
Plot
El Echo, a remote village in
Puebla
Puebla ( en, colony, settlement), officially Free and Sovereign State of Puebla ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Puebla), is one of the 32 states which comprise the Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided into 217 municipalities and its cap ...
, the Mexican highlands, where conditions change drastically between seasons, the children tend to the sheep and take care of their elders. Dealing with the frost and drought, the children learn to understand death, illness, and love from every word and every silence of their parents. ''The Echo'' is a story about the echo of what lies in the soul, about the certainty of warmth from those around us, "about rebellion and vertigo in the face of life" and "about growing up".
Cast
* ''Montserrat Hernández Hernández'' as Montse
* ''María de los Ángeles Pacheco Tapia'' as Abuela Angeles
* ''Luz María Vázquez González'' as Luz Ma
* ''Sarahí Rojas Hernández'' as Sarahí
* ''William Antonio Vázquez González'' as Toño
* ''Uriel Hernández Hernández'' as Uriel
* ''Ramiro Hernández Hernández'' as Ramiro
* ''Berenice Cortés Muñoz'' as Bere
* ''Andrea González Lima'' as Andrea
Production
The film is the fifth feature film by
Tatiana Huezo
Tatiana Huezo Sánchez (; born 9 January 1972) is a film director of Salvadoran and Mexican nationality, residing in Mexico. Her first film, ' (2011), a documentary about the Salvadoran Civil War, has been awarded internationally. In 2016 she p ...
. Her two previous documentaries, ''El lugar más pequeño'' (2011) and ''
Tempestad'' (2016), with this film forms a "trilogy of pain and trauma". She followed three families for one full year in the remote village in Mexico to film the project.
Release
The film was invited to Horizons section of
57th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival
The 57th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival took place from 30 June to July 8, 2023, in Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic.Will Tizard"Russell Crowe, Alicia Vikander Wow Karlovy Vary Film Festival Crowds as 57th Edition Kicks Off" ''Variety'', 30 ...
, where it was screened on 30 June 2023. It was also invited to the
27th Lima Film Festival
The 27th Lima Film Festival, organized by the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru, took place from 10–18 August 2023 in Lima, Peru. The awards were announced on 18 August 2023, with ''Tótem'' winning the Trophy Spondylus.
Background
On ...
for competing in Documentary section, where it was screened on 12 August 2023.
The film also made it to 'Latin Horizons' section of the
71st San Sebastián International Film Festival
The 71st San Sebastián International Film Festival will run 22–30 September 2023 in San Sebastián, Gipuzkoa, Spain.
Background
In May 2023, actor Javier Bardem was announced as a recipient of a Donostia Award as well as the main feature of ...
held from 22 to 30 September 2023.
The film was screened at
2023 BFI London Film Festival
The 67th BFI London Film Festival is a film festival took place from 4–15 October 2023. The competition films were announced on 29 August 2023 while the films for the galas and the strands were revealed on 31 August 2023. The juries for the vari ...
in 'Strand' section under 'Journey' theme on 8 October; and on 20 October at the
Vienna International Film Festival
The Vienna International Film Festival, or Viennale, is a film festival taking place every October since 1960 in Vienna, Austria.
The average number of visitors is about 75,000. Traditional cinema venues are ''Gartenbaukino'', ''Urania'', ''Metro ...
in Features section.
Reception
Critical response
On the review aggregator
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
website, the film has an approval rating of 100% based on 9 reviews, with an average rating of 8.3/10.
On
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
, it has a weighted average score of 91 out of 100 based on 5 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim".
Guy Lodge reviewing at Berlin Film Festival, for
Variety wrote, "This exquisitely textured film observes how children’s lives echo those of their parents, repeating for generations on the same constantly inconstant land, until somebody breaks the pattern." Lodge stated that
Tatiana Huezo
Tatiana Huezo Sánchez (; born 9 January 1972) is a film director of Salvadoran and Mexican nationality, residing in Mexico. Her first film, ' (2011), a documentary about the Salvadoran Civil War, has been awarded internationally. In 2016 she p ...
"observes this splintering community with unsentimental tenderness". He opined that the traditionally-inflected score of Leonardo Heiblum and Jacobo Lieberman occasionally sweetened the proceedings. Concluding, he said, "At the close, a hot white slice of lightning breaks the screen, signaling relief after a lengthy drought, but hardly an idealized long-term solution to the greater generational problems facing El Eco."
Sheri Linden for ''
The Hollywood Reporter
''The Hollywood Reporter'' (''THR'') is an American digital and print magazine which focuses on the Cinema of the United States, Hollywood film industry, film, television, and entertainment industries. It was founded in 1930 as a daily trade pap ...
'' called the film "A resounding achievement" and quoting dialogues from the film between father and daughter which goes as: "Work is work," "It’s not easy," he adds. "You have to do it with love." Linden opined that
Tatiana Huezo
Tatiana Huezo Sánchez (; born 9 January 1972) is a film director of Salvadoran and Mexican nationality, residing in Mexico. Her first film, ' (2011), a documentary about the Salvadoran Civil War, has been awarded internationally. In 2016 she p ...
"in this clear-eyed and warmhearted chronicle, has done precisely that." Wendy Ide for
ScreenDaily wrote in review that the film is "an intimate, immersive portrait of a way of life – its rhythms, hardships and its communal joys – told through the eyes of the young people who rarely question it." Vladan Petkovic writing for
Cineuropa
The MEDIA sub-programme of Creative Europe or simply Creative Europe MEDIA (formerly The MEDIA Programme of the European Union) is designed to support the European film and audiovisual industries.
Budget
The goal of programmers is to increase the ...
stated, "True to its title, ''The Echo'' is about the background, about leftovers, and things left unsaid and never done. Petkovic concluding said, "It is a beautiful film that manages to be simultaneously restrained and immersive, poetic and earthy."
Accolades
See also
*
96th Academy Awards
The 96th Academy Awards is an upcoming ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), which will honor the best 2023 in film, films of 2023, and is expected to take place at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Los Ange ...
*
Submissions for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature
*
Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature Film
References
External links
*
''The Echo''at IDFA
*
at Berlinale
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Echo, The
2023 films
2020s Mexican films
Mexican documentary films
German documentary films
2023 documentary films
2020s Spanish-language films
Films shot in Mexico