Stylish but barely mediocre overall

Overrated and overhyped

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Blistering performances.

The great telescopes of the Atacama desert, they look into the sky as well as our hearts. In our lifetimes the Pinochet regime tortured and/or killed over 60,000 people. This enthralling documentary, both sorrowful and hopeful, explores how stars, history and victims as well as survivors of an oppressive regime merge into one.The images of a body with legs still chained and wrists bound, people digging in the desert for remains of their loved ones, a country that does not acknowledge the recent past, the testimony of a woman who lost her parents and drawings from the Chacabuco concentration camp merge with images of galaxies and supernovas, and talk of a current of energy, new life, pulsing through our existence. It is powerful stuff. Transitions and better organization are all that are wanting with this film.

I have seen a few of the small number of documentaries featured in the book 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, this Spanish language one I was hoping would be another worth entry. Narrated by director Patricio Guzmán the film opens in the Atacama Desert in Chile, a place in the world with no moisture whatsoever. Astronomers are peering deep into the cosmos of space, looking at the alignment of planets and stars, searching for answers concerning the origins of life, on Earth and possibly elsewhere. Also in the desert are a group of women sifting through the sand searching for the body parts of people, including their loved ones, who were killed in concentration camps and dumped unceremoniously during the regime of Pinochet. This film is both an insight into astrology and a political look into Chile's dark past, it has great visuals of the desert and outer space, and also features archaeology and footage of the historical horror of death under Pinochet. I will admit it was not easy to follow the entire film, because it switched the two genres every so often, and you obviously have to read the subtitles during, it's not the sort of film I'd see more than once, but it was an interesting enough documentary. Worth watching, at least once, in my opinion!

A painting that unites astronomy, the present, the past and the collective memory of a people. A story you through from end to end and leaves you vibrating in a note holding and is resonating very hard in the chest. How to join two things as seemingly dissimilar as astronomy and the search for a past that still bleeds and want silent but still present. The astronomers point their telescopes to the huge big sky of Atacama to find new galaxies, stars lost or the same origin of the universe, and the telescope is pointing Guzman inward consciousness of a people and of horror to keep the memory alive.Thanks Patrick for this film as needed.

"Nostalgia for the light" takes us on a journey through Chile's Atacama's desert. Throughout this documentary, Patricio Guzman becomes a key interlocutor weaving images, interviews and poetics. This story of a nation's history, pain, joy, discovery and the unknown pulls us into a well of thought. A group of women search for their beloved ones killed during Pinochia's Military dictatorship. Astronomers discover the early beginnings of life. Archaeologists narrate the history of lost civilizations. They revisit the desert each time in search for answers to the same questions.We shift through two realms through the ethereal sounds and sights that form throughout the film. The past, present and future constitute our lives. Amnesia is a nation's curse up until front- liners revive history.