Nuestro tiempo

It’s always exciting when a director who isn’t also an actor choses to play the lead in his own film; when he casts his wife as his character’s spouse and his children as this couple’s off-spring, things invariably turn crazy in one’s mind: What are they collectively acting out here? Especially when the subject is marital life and infidelity, as here in NUESTRO TIEMPO, Carlos Reygadas’s latest, in some way wildest movie so far – if in other ways merely the logical next step after the soi disant semi-autobiographical POST TENEBRAE LUX (2012). Reygadas plays poet-ranch owner Juan who finds out that his wife Esther is having an affair with his friend Phil, a horse-breaker. Despite being hurt by her secrecy about this, Juan isn’t exactly unhappy about this turn of events as he’d always longed for a more open relationship – and so, not only does he encourage Esther to keep things hot and running with Phil but also to have a go at her erstwhile flame Santiago ... When a director who’s not an actor steps in front of his own camera, he gives up a lot of control – and isn’t that what NUESTRO TIEMPO is all about: the vanity of men trying to keep on top of things? Could it be that NUESTRO TIEMPO is the most unexpected of treats from Reygadas: a slow-cinema screwball comedy? (Olaf Möller)