Film Review: Rodrigo Reyes’ “499”
Modern-day footage gets a sci-fi twist in this exploration of the vexed legacy of Mexico’s Spanish conquest.
This article is adapted from AQ’s special report on the battle over fake news A man washes up on a Mexican shore, dressed in 16th-century Spanish attire. Seconds later, an emblematic metal helmet with a flat brim washes up next to him: He is a conquistador. But as he begins to walk, he is confronted with contemporary scenery, signaled by a broken plastic cup. He is lost in time, finding himself unexpectedly in 21st-century Mexico, 499 years after the fall of the great Aztec capital Tenochtitlán. A fictitious, anachronistic conquistador faces real, unscripted people in...
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