It would be wrong to say that "slow cinema," as the genre is sometimes called, is simply a pigeonhole for arthouse movies in which not a lot happens and no thought is given to making it not happen a little more quickly. For bad movies, in other words. But this is not always the case. Many years ago, in a state of jet-lagged exhaustion, I attended a screening of Silent Light, a movie by the Mexican director Carlos Reygadas, a celebrated devotee of cinematic slowness. As the picture's opening shots of slowly spreading dawn sunlight crawled along for about six wordless minutes, followed by the realization that the story we were about to see would be set in a colony of German-speaking Mennonite farmers in northern Mexico, I began to feel a huge nap coming on.
But the movie cast an unexpected spell. One of the farmers, a happily married man, fell in love with another woman, and in a transport of candor decided to admit this to his wife, and to keep her posted as the affair progressed. Spiritual complexities arose and the cast, composed entirely of non-actors, negotiated them convincingly. By the end of the film, all thoughts of napping had fled. Silent Light might be slow, and obscure, but I'd watch it again.
