Ben Rivers's latest film, Mare's Nest, premiered at the Locarno Film Festival, offering an opaque yet intriguing reflection on existence and the climate crisis. The experimental cine-poem adapts Don DeLillo's 2007 one-act play The Word for Snow, exploring a postapocalyptic world through the eyes of a child.
The narrative follows Moon (Moon Guo Barker), a child wandering a desolate landscape populated only by other children. In a striking monochrome sequence, she glimpses adult figures frozen in a tunnel, reminiscent of the victims of Pompeii. Her journey, from escaping a crashed car to driving off happily, is punctuated by dreamlike encounters with children who speak with prophetic, adult-like voices.
Dialogue in the film is marked by pungent aphorisms, such as 'The word for snow will be the snow,' suggesting a future where language itself is erased. The scenario echoes DeLillo's Cosmopolis, adapted by David Cronenberg, with its gnomic exchanges in a sterile, end-of-days setting. Rivers introduces three weird child sisters, a scholar with a translator, and other infant-like figures, evoking a mix of Shakespeare and Pasolini.
A notable scene features a Minotaur roaming the Lithica labyrinth in Menorca, a colossal stone artwork. Later, a gravestone with a single handprint hints at a primitive, wordless memorial for humanity. The film's uncanny quality builds slowly, with dialogue that, while occasionally stilted, carries an unearthly, somnambulist tone, as if alien intelligences speak through the children.
Whether Mare's Nest itself is a 'mare's nest'—a complicated situation with illusory significance—remains open. Rivers's stern, enigmatic address to the audience reflects the confidence of an ancient mariner, leaving viewers to ponder the film's challenging layers.
