Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw’s Gaucho Gaucho is a mesmerizing study of form and image-making, a film as preoccupied with its subjects as it is with the act of capturing them. Gaucho Gaucho premiered at Sundance in 2024, and follows in the footsteps of the pair’s celebrated The Truffle Hunters (2020), another documentary rooted in tradition, a profound sense of place, and a close relationship with nature. Over two years, the filmmakers immersed themselves in the rhythms of a tight-knit gaucho community in northwest Argentina. Using exquisite black-and-white cinematography, the filmmaking pair designed a visual language that uses the kind of texture and depth usually found in fine art photography. In their frames, dust swirls in the Pampas like mist, each black branch of a dead tree is felt, and the rockface of a canyon has infinite detail.
The first words spoken in the film are delivered by a man in a floppy hat and priest’s robes, perched on a leafless tree in the middle of the grasslands, as if addressing an unseen congregation. “Dawn is breaking in the Calchaquí Valleys. The sun is rising and getting closer to me,” he proclaims, arms outstretched as though speaking to the vastness around him. (In Spanish, the lines rhyme, lending the speech the cadence of a chant or poem.) This declaration sets the tone for the film’s emphasis on staged performance and the stylized delivery of its subjects. Along with its black-and-white, static, and carefully composed frames, the scene makes it clear that Gaucho Gaucho is far from a “fly-on-the-wall” documentary. The gauchos speak with a rhythm so measured and lyrical it feels almost scripted, and the film unfolds not as a straightforward narrative but as a series of crafted vignettes. The gauchos eat, herd cattle, dance, worry about a flock of vultures, sing, joke about girlfriends, and wander the vast grasslands.
The Gaucho, often likened to the American cowboy, holds a central place in South American folklore. The mythology surrounding them emerged during Argentina’s War of Independence, when mixed and Indigenous nomadic horsemen were said to have outsmarted the Spanish with their superior horse riding, endurance, and familiarity with the terrain. The etymology of “gaucho” is unknown, though one theory is that it derives from the Quechua word huachu, meaning vagabond or orphan. After the war, these horsemen settled in the Pampas — grasslands near Argentina, Uruguay, and Bolivia — where they developed a nomadic farming and herding lifestyle. This legacy inspired a rich literary tradition, epitomized by Martín Fierro, a Don Quixote-like epic of a noble gaucho turned outlaw. Over time, the gaucho became both a celebrated folkloric icon and a commodified symbol, a duality wrestled with by writers like Jorge Luis Borges in “The South” and later Roberto Bolaño in “The Insufferable Gaucho.”
Dweck and Kershaw’s decision to shoot in black-and-white was, as they describe it, an intuitive choice, determined after spending some time shooting the landscapes. The film’s lush monochrome visuals, symmetrical compositions, and tactile textures invite viewers to absorb rather than analyze and creates a timeless aesthetic that evokes fine art photography more than traditional documentary. There are only 147 shots in the film, and as the viewer, one feels that each one was carefully and painstakingly designed and constructed. The filmmakers embrace artifice, presenting the gaucho’s way of life not as raw reality but, at least in part, as the carefully orchestrated interplay of cultural symbols and aesthetic design. At times, its meticulous framing might remind one of Wes Anderson’s 90° angles or Matthew Rankin’s stage-like constructions in this year’s Universal Language.
Yet similarly to Anderson or Rankin’s work, Gaucho Gaucho never loses sight of the humanity of its subjects. The film strikes a delicate balance between homage and portraiture, crucially offering an intimate look at relationships and dynamics within the gaucho community. While the formal style and possibly scripted dialogue create a sense of orchestration, they work in tandem with moments of heartfelt connection. A father uses shadow puppets to tell his children a fable, two men joke about their past romances, and Gaura’s father candidly shares his thoughts about participation in the rodeo. These glimpses of personal relationships ground the film in an emotional reality that complements its stylized presentation.
And for all its beauty, Gaucho Gaucho avoids sentimentality. Its lighthearted tone and eclectic soundtrack — tango, classical music, and tracks by Devendra Banhart — infuse playfulness and energy. Moments of humor, like teenage Gaura practicing horse-taming by riding a barrel while her father and friends jostle the ropes, add absurdity, cutting through any potential pretense. In the end, Gaucho Gaucho honors the gaucho’s legacy while also playfully acknowledging the artifice at the heart of its construction.
DIRECTOR: Michael Dweck & Gregory Kershaw; DISTRIBUTOR: Jolt; IN THEATERS: October 25; STREAMING: November 30; RUNTIME: 1 hr. 25 min.
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