¿NO OYES LADRAR LOS PERROS?
(DO YOU HEAR THE DOGS BARKING?)
dir. François Reichenbach, 1975
82 min. Mexico/France.
In Spanish with English subtitles.

FRIDAY, MAY 5 – 10 PM
WEDNESDAY, MAY 10 – 10 PM
SATURDAY, MAY 20 – 10 PM
FRIDAY, MAY 26 – 7:30 PM

This Mexican-French co-production premiered at the 1975 Cannes Film Festival, where director François Reichenbach received praise for his adaptation of Juan Rulfo’s original story. Adapted with the help of Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes alongside two French screenwriters, the film intercuts between a father seeking help for his ailing son and the imagined future of a young indigenous man looking for work in Mexico City. In weaving these parallel stories together, Reichenbach appeals to allegory, fusing religious visions, surrealist skits and dreams into the lives of its characters.

Reichenbach’s late-career devotion to fiction filmmaking is often overshadowed by his earlier work as a biting documentarian. AMERICA AS SEEN BY A FRENCHMAN (1960) sees him interrogate the eponymous nation’s power structures as he drives across the country in Tocquevillian fashion and his collaboration with Chris Marker, THE SIXTH SIDE OF THE PENTAGON (1968), records the largest anti-Vietnam protest in the U.S. up until that point. His attention to the absurdity inherent to government with capitalist tenets would become a staple of his filmmaking, influencing his approach at representing the perils of the downtrodden wherever his camera took him.