This impressive first feature film from director Carlos Reygadas, deservedly a contender for the top prize at the Cannes Film Festival last year, is a sexually charged and corporeal cinematic experience. Mysterious and contemplative, it provides a portrait of a man planning suicide, and the striking intensity of the landscape he chooses, or perhaps has chosen him, in which to end his life. Intending to die in peace and solitude, the nameless middle aged man begins a spiritual and physical journey that lands him in unexpected territory. An artist and intellectual, he leaves the turbulence of Mexico City. After a long car ride, he ends up on a footpath leading to a small village in rural Mexico. Seeking a place to stay, he is directed to the home of Ascen, an elderly widow living alone. She agrees to allow him to sleep in her barn. Through the relationship that develops between them, he embarks on an odyssey that alters his understanding of himself and the larger world. The deliberate, slow pacing captures the physical and the emotional landscape in all its bleakness, beauty, and visceral organic life.

At first shunning connection, he limps about the canyon, watching the schoolchildren file past or reacting painfully to finding the decaying corpse of a dead horse, as if he himself were experiencing the death. Alone in his bed, a surreal quality blurs the lines of reality and we're unsure at times if we are witnessing his dreams or actual events. As he struggles with internal conflicts, his awareness of Ascen increases and he becomes somewhat protective of her. He is annoyed that she is being taken advantage of by her nephew who wants the stones of which her house is built. She is old and poor, but carries on. As he has come to this place precisely to not carry on, he is intrigued. In one of many paradoxes, he does not want to continue his life but wants to see that she may continue hers. After he sees her in a dream as both a young, beautiful woman on a beach and also as old Ascen, the sexual nature of his musings intensifies.

Ascen considers why he came to this place, but when he makes an agonizing request of her, she straightforwardly accepts him. The village sees him as an outsider. Her home, in turn, is set apart from the village. They share something essential that neither can name. In this cast of mostly non-actors, Magdalena Flores shines with a purity and bravery that is difficult to believe any trained actor could accomplish. Encouraged by her children and director Reygadas, she embraced the experience and delivers a remarkable performance. We rarely see a woman over the age of 30, much less over the age of 80, undressed on the screen, as though women cease to posses human sexuality as they age. Alejandro Ferretis lays bare the soul of the man all but forsaking his own existence. Together on screen, as we see them in close up, the age difference dissolves into the more significant characteristic they share of essential humanity. However, they are not the same. Old, poor, and uncomplicated, she reveals her strength and confidence in who she is, while he weeps at discovering feelings he can not explain.

Shot mostly in the rarefied light of morning and evening, and making full use of the lush widescreen format, and 360-degree panoramic views, the mood is steeped in the atmosphere of the canyon. Profoundly visual, the shapes of sticks and stones, intersecting vertical and horizontal lines in trees and buildings, of earth and sky, a spider in the corner, slats on the barn, the horsetail clouds in the sky: all are captured with the artist's eye. A visceral experience filled with tactile sights and sensations, the soundtrack adds depth with the sounds of the natural landscape. Traditional, indigenous folk music or jarring mechanical sounds punctuate the visuals. The depiction of a slaughtered pig carries a terrible, beautiful eloquence. Reminiscent of A Taste of Cherry thematically, Reygadas sites Andrei Tarkovsky and Werner Herzog as influences. Here, however, the director moves in new directions as he openly, with simultaneous clarity and ambiguity, lays out a host of possibilities for the viewer to decipher. The minimal narrative was inspired by an acquaintance who was a man of cultivation and ideas, but who lacked a basic ability to find joy in life. An earthy, ritual driven religiosity for Ascen adds to the intricacy and she poignantly makes peace with God before saying yes to the man. Perhaps we care more for Ascen than for him because she cares more for herself. She prays daily at her shrine, out of a comfortable rhythmic custom, more than out of deep saintly conviction. This complex, minimalist film is one of the most thought provoking to come along in a while.