North Terminal

During the 2020 lockdown, Lucrecia Martel returns to her home in Salta, Argentina’s most conservative region. Here she follows Julieta Laso who, like a muse, introduces her to a group of female artists and defiant people who exchange glances and opinions around a fire. Perfectly attuned to a body of work that constructs stories from an amalgam of people and places and, four years after the beautiful Zama, Terminal Norte marks the return to the screen of Argentina’s greatest filmmaker. Once again, there is a sense of being on the periphery of the world in a way that is simultaneously real, symbolic and political. Now working in a documentary format, Martel immerses herself and gets lost in Julieta Laso’s hoarse, seductive voice. And then, in a progression that has now become familiar to us, the “I” of the protagonist opens up to encounter a plethora of voices and bodies which the camera never tires of following. The result is a gripping tribute to a community that, temporary though it may be, serves as a magnificent antidote to the pandemic.