In the Bolivian highlands, an elderly Quechua couple has been living the same daily life for years. During an uncommonly long drought, Virginio and his wife Sisa face a dilemma: resist, or be defeated by the environment and time itself.... (Full plot summary below)
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In the Bolivian highlands, an elderly Quechua couple has been living the same daily life for years. During an uncommonly long drought, Virginio and his wife Sisa face a dilemma: resist, or be defeated by the environment and time itself.
Leave your thoughts about Utama.
| RogerEbert.comGlenn KennyUtama sounds a warning even as it casts a spell, and the spell is one of life and death and eternal returns and never-ending struggles, and the rest we can try to take when the work is done for the day. |
| Film ThreatAlex SavelievAn elegiac, minimalist fable, Utama is about many things: global warming, survival, our connections to each other, our priorities. It’s the silences that propel the narrative forward, the wide-open spaces that sear themselves into the mind. But hope prevails. |
| IndieWireCarlos AguilarFor all its otherworldly beauty, “Utama” could benefit from slightly more robust dramatic beats to complement the hyper-sensorial experience that imbues in the spectator, especially in addressing the displacement of Indigenous communities across the Americas and beyond. |
| TheWrapKatie WalshIt is a spare and yet unsparing film, and a bold artistic statement from an emerging filmmaker. |
| Screen DailyWendy IdeThrough the love story at the heart of this visually arresting feature debut, Utama offers the audience a relatable connection with a way of life which is on the verge of extinction. |
| The Hollywood ReporterJordan MintzerUtama is very much a pessimistic film, never shying away from the realities faced by those who still inhabit the highlands of Bolivia. And yet it’s also convincingly, and sometimes movingly, optimistic. |
| Time OutDavid HughesIt’s an astonishingly assured and emotionally engrossing debut. Grisi’s background as an award-winning photographer is evident in the composition of every shot, almost any one of which could hang on the wall of a gallery wall. Yet his narrative focus is always on Virginio and Sisa, whose expressions of intimacy and love are largely non-verbal yet deeply felt. |
| Screen RantNadir SamaraNo part of Utama feels fabricated. The costumes are a part of the environment; the camera work is as simple as it could be, but what is in front of the camera is elevated by a lovely stillness. Alvarez turns Bolivia into a series of portraits and Grisi is the perfect conduit to tell such a specific tale of love and life. |
| The PlaylistGregory EllwoodAdmittedly, Utama is a simple story, but one that packs an emotional punch without endless exposition or symbolism. |
| The Film StageDavid KatzUtama is a slow-motion look at how communities can falter, how rich heritage can be lost—to indifference from governments as well as a climate crisis that will decimate their way of life. If only it weren’t so gentle in its reminder. |
