NBFF 2022 | Movie Review: Cacophony and Heresy in "Raquel 1:1"
8/12 ForReel Score | 3.5/5 Stars
There is something rumbling down in South America, and it isn't that mysterious "boom" sound that Tilda Swinton's character keeps hearing in Memoria. Raquel (Valentina Herszage) has just moved with her father Hermes (Emilio de Mello) to his small home town in Brazil, where an evangelical fanaticism pervades as the domineering religious standard, and while Raquel at first intends to embrace this theology--just as her late mother did before her--she later comes to see her religion's teachings as troublesome; the word of God as a text written exclusively by men, in sore need of women's revision. She begins to host regular meetings in an abandoned building with a small gathering of her female friends, collaboratively reinterpreting the Bible. All the while, she is haunted by memories of her mother, who saw a violent end at the hands of a male assailant.
Raquel 1:1, the second feature from Brazilian director Mariana Bastos, is a psych-horror chronicling a young woman's reckoning with a brutal trauma, and her simultaneous reckoning with the tenets that facilitate continued traumas. Think a more subdued and nuanced version of Verhoeven's recent Benedetta, with the histrionics dialed back, the queer aspects less forefront, and the tone less bombastic, but its critiques no less pointed in their aim against the outdated conventions that allow acts of assault and violence to go unchecked. Bastos tells a tale of honour-driven heretics menaced over by a conservative majority and the unshakable omnipotence of past digressions.
While Raquel 1:1 is not a film that could ever be considered as audacious as a film like Benedetta (I suppose it is more akin to 2019's Saint Maud), it is still an engrossing and immersive effort, paced assuredly and coloured with impressive performances. These performances have to do some heavy lifting, seeing as the film insists on a drab colour palette and some cheap-looking film techniques, but Bastos has still made the most of her limited budget and shooting schedule (production on Raquel 1:1 apparently wrapped after only 20 days). What truly shines is the film's sound design and score, which create a cavernous aural environ that hits you on a guttural level, and envelops you in feelings of dread and distress. Raquel 1:1 is certainly a film that could be appreciated in audio format alone.
Though not everything coalesces by the end of Bastos' film--a result of its admittedly abstract, symbolic structuring--the ride is no less riveting, no less simmering with titillating implication. Herszage wows as a beguiling lead, and a good handful of striking scenes throughout the film suggest Bastos has a very distinct voice pronouncing itself. Raquel 1:1 was the first film I caught at North Bend Film Festival 2022, and it is a clear signifier that the programmers have their focus on genre film excellence.
