barrunto

"barrunto” is a word used in Puerto Rico to refer to a bodily unrest, an omen or a forecast sensed via signals present in the environment (such as when rain is forecast through aches and pains or when ants emerge anticipating an earthquake). “Barrunto” is a way of thinking with surface and subconscious, underfoot and underground. BARRUNTO is a speculative narrative informed by poetry and theories of quantum entanglement across diasporic distance. An intimate exploration of grief and resistance in shifting landscapes of loss, from the streets to the bed; in sites of displacement, nuclear contamination, and military occupation from Scotland to Puerto Rico; from the bottom of the ocean to the planet Uranus; using digital, archival, and 16mm film hand-processed in “grief tea.” from its deep vibration tracks to the nonlinear narrative, barrunto is a film that attempts to activate sensations and modes of being with the world and in connection beyond western frameworks of knowledge and understanding. Made in collaboration with artists in Scotland and Puerto Rico including Sound Production by Claude Nouk, Music & Voiceover by Shanti LaLita, Archival Footage by Andrés Nieves and Karla Claudio Betancourt, Voices by Alicia Matthews & Harry Josephine Giles, Translation by Nicole Cecilia Delgado, Animation by Sharif Elsabagh, integrated captions consultation by Bea Webster & Ciaran Stewart, featuring poems by Gallego, Ursula Le Guin & June Jordan. “At barrunto’s sticky, tender core is the power of artistic collaboration. A multiplicity of living voices, attuned to feelings of loss and slow ecological violence, imagine other possible worlds. The intricate constellation of scientific and speculative sounds – and sound descriptions – is sense tickling; from the click click click of a spiking radiation metre and the eeriness of snapping shrimps, to the delirious sound of Uranus’ giggles and hypnotic Puerto Rican protest songs. Emilia Beatriz turns to the language of quantum physics to speak of their own diasporic experience, that of bodies gravitating towards each other despite the distance that separates them. barrunto is a healing, porous and alchemical experience like the hawthorn berries that Beatriz used to develop some of the film’s footage.” (Ane Lopez - BMFAF)

Year

2024

Director

Emilia Beatriz

Duration

70 min

Country

Puerto Rico

Language

English, Spanish