Sybille Bauer
Austria
2015 / 0:11:30

They hammered. They cursed. Yelling. It was dark, no light. An unpleasant, eye-stinging smell. She stayed quiet. The stones hurt. It’s wet. How many? The camera drags the viewer through dark, abstract rooms. A young girl whispers. The content of a biblical story becomes a contemporary state.

Alexander Hick
Germany, Ecuador
2015 / 1:16:00


In order to escape being sacrificed, the God Xólotl transforms himself into a salamander, fleeing from what he once was." So relates the voice in the essay film which tells of the search for the Axolotl, a salamander that lives in the lakes surrounding Mexico City. The Axolotl refuses to undergo metamorphosis. According to a fishermen who survives on the outskirts of the megalopolis, the animal now disappeared. Cognizant of the mythological immortality that surrounds the strange creature, he expresses the desire to transform into one himself. Taking up this mythology of transformation from god to animal as a metaphor for Mexico City itself, the director accompanies a corrupt policeman and brutal gang members in the sprawling suburbs of the megalopolis. He examines the struggle for survival in what was the former lake of Mexico but is today the habitat of 23 million people. As an essayistic inquiry into survival and adaptation, the film casts its gaze on that which remains.