“Alonso finds a remarkable amount of beauty and humanity in the everyday lives of his characters”

Playing in this year’s Toronto International Film Festival’s Wavelengths program is the latest film from Argentine director Lisandro Alonso, titled Double Freedom (La Libertad Doble). The film is a quasi-sequel to his 2001 film La Libertad, though it’s not necessary to be familiar with his prior work before seeing this. The film, which also premiered in the Directors’ Fortnight section of this year’s Cannes Film Festival, is a remarkable achievement in slow cinema, filled with an amazing sense of humanity and compassion.

The film begins with many lengthy scenes featuring Misael Saavedra (played by himself), years after his appearance in La Libertad. He is still young, but noticeably older. He spends his days cutting wood and living alongside his dog. He gets the logs ready for his neighbor, who is placing a fence around his land in order to keep his livestock from escaping. Misael lives off the land and from the support of his neighbor, leading a mostly peaceful life in his makeshift aluminum house.

Misael receives notice that his sister, Micaela Saavedra (Catalina Saavedra, no relation to Misael Saavedra), has snuck out of the mental asylum where she has lived for many years. After she is found, Misael goes into town to visit her, where the doctor at the mostly empty hospital explains that government funding has dried up and the hospital will soon be closed. The situation carries an obvious contemporary resonance in Argentina, where President Javier Milei’s austerity policies have brought significant cuts to public healthcare and government agencies, including major reductions in health spending and staffing.

Micaela has become reliant on daily medications, including a combination of seroquel and haloperidol, both of which are used to treat schizophrenia, among other conditions. Misael is Micaela’s only significant relative, and he will now have to start taking care of her. The doctor notes that Micaela is one of his patients who does the best and needs the least amount of care. Misael takes the news relatively well, though he is worried about how he will be able to pay for his sister’s medications after the initial monthly supply runs out. Further, he will now have to provide for two people and figure out where Micaela will sleep.

One of the main highlights of the film, besides the impeccable acting by the non-professional actors, is the amazing widescreen 35mm cinematography by Cobi Migliora. Every shot transports and amazes, creating a fully exhilarating work of art. Scenes and shots that might otherwise seem mundane are imbued with so much beauty that the film moves surprisingly quickly despite its pace. Alonso finds beauty in the simplest of activities, allowing the camera to linger without his images becoming boring. 

La Libertad focuses heavily on a life lived off the grid and the freedom to do what one wants. Misael chops wood and goes about his everyday tasks, largely left alone to live the way he chooses. Ironically, with Micaela’s freedom, Misael may lose some of his own. With Double Freedom, Alonso expands upon these activities by adding his sister into Misael’s otherwise solitary existence. Here, the second freedom refers to Micaela’s freedom from the mental asylum, where the doctor’s protocol was essentially to “lock her up and fill her with drugs.” She never needed so much isolation from the world, and now she may actually be able to improve by spending more time outside in nature and from being exposed to other people.

Interestingly enough, Alonso’s presentation of Micaela seems to be in direct communication with another film from this year’s Toronto and Cannes Film Festivals, Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s All of a Sudden. In Hamaguchi’s film, he pushes for utmost compassion toward people with disabilities. In Double Freedom, Alonso does something similar, but through a very different presentation. Unlike Hamaguchi, who is borderline didactic in his approach, Alonso instead simply shows Micaela’s character. He shows how she acts and, if anything, explains her condition through his camera. He shows her love for clocks and her need for routines. His camera never judges her, but only humanizes her.

The film is highly compelling, and despite featuring long shots captured on an expansive 35mm format, the film never bores and remains extremely engaging. Alonso finds a remarkable amount of beauty and humanity in the everyday lives of his characters, allowing the film’s deliberate pace to become part of its emotional power. With Double Freedom, Alonso has directed one of the great films of the year and continues to establish himself as one of the most important directors.