Arquivo

A documentary that follows closely the life of muleteers that still exist in the old tea route, on some of the highest and most dangerous roads of the world stretched between China and Tibet. The director films these narrow windy roads, and also detains himself at small villages along River Nijiang Valley, depicting a way of life that is in progressive extinction. Images show packs of overloaded mules, balancing themselves on highly narrow roads, and shaky wooden bridges over very high abysms. From the top, great rivers resemble threads of water. In other sequences, the caravans are shown at a greater distance, making people and animals seem like ants within the immenseness of nature. One of the muleteers testifies how much his life depends on the mules, praising their resistance, and at the same time regretting the dwindling of his pack. In fact, the film is named after one of the surviving mules of this muleteer – “Delamu” means “pacific angel”, showing the affective closeness between men and animals in this context. In the rustic villages of River Nijiang and in Yuannan Valley, old inhabitants remember the unease experienced there during the Cultural Revolution. What prevails, however, in the end, is the Zen-Buddhist tranquility of this atmosphere, seized by the camera in long sequences under natural light, with snapshots of perhaps an ephemeral balance between man and nature.