User Reviews

Obviously written and directed by mostly men with no real knowledge of Mapuche history. The parts about her grandmothers teachings, community spirit, and connectedness and defense of the forests of Chile is beautiful. The settings are gorgeous, I had no idea Chile has forests like that. Ok actually really liked the actors, especially Sayen. I just wish they had a better story and direction to work with.

But that's only a small part of the movie. There's a lot of the typical suffering porn that studios insist on for Native movies. In Sayen it takes the form first of her Grandmother being murdered by a young psychopath suffering from the generational trauma from his fathers greed and villainous corporate operations that he is supposed to uphold and expand. His character is pretty well done and believable. Incompetent, vicious and unstable with disastrous consequences for the communities he comes in contact with. But there's too much of him surviving till the end even above a black beret and a Russian mercenary that's been with their family for decades. Not believable at all and just to drive the story of conflict and gross action between him and Sayen. The most believable part is when the team geologist fatally wounds himself accidently stepping in front of an arrow meant for this man. Dumb luck is often how such people survive.

Sayen has trained her whole life to be a warrior for her people. Yet in the movie her movements (and the other warriors) are clumsy. She gets badly hurt every time she falls in a river or encounters one of the bad people even tho they come out largely unscathed - not even bruised. The black berets braids don't even get messed up! The main murderer and this black beret even come out of a river in weather where you can see peoples breathe and they're not even scared, or wet or cold. Supposedly a tiny fire dries them? Typical (maybe unconscious) biases depicting natives as less competent and easily murdered. The Grandmothers murder was unexpected and shocking and believable (even when you know it's coming you don't know how), but Sayen's warrior teacher and friends just get shot TF up so quickly and easily. Dumb.

And lastly it was maddening and silly to have the BS about warriors always only being men. That has never been true for Native societies, it's just a falsehood perpetuated by colonialism so that many Natives don't even know this was untrue. So having it crop up unnecessarily in a movie that handles that matriarchal knowledge and forest protection of her grandmother so well was disappointing. Again it seems like a few things just done to further the action story rather than creating a nuanced and interesting and authentic story.

"Sayen" was an all-too familiar story of imperialism as the native tribe of the Mapuce in Chile is exploited by a company coveting the cobalt on ancestral lands in the forest.

The strength of the film was the spectacular photography and the touching character of the grandmother of Sayen. The old woman spoke for the traditional values and the importance of taking a stand against the mining corporation.

A shortcoming was the emphasis on an action film with improbable chase scenes through the forest as Sayen seeks to evade yet desires revenge against the greedy imperialists who are in hot pursuit.

The ending was disappointing in that it never resolved the matter of the ancestral lands for the Mapuche. Nor did it explain whether the journalist José survived his gunshot wound to publicly proclaim the true story of how the grandmother was murdered.

This was only an average film. But there was enormous talent both in the cast and the production team.

I liked how it did put lots of things together like some tribunes that existed and still does, also the people who puts their lives on danger just to protect their heritage . To ne honest, i liked the acting skills of both lead actors that showed a perfect choice by the director. I didn't feel anything that could be fake about the story which i admire really because most of times i quit watching some series and films because i don't feel any reality in it . I really hope i can see more of film like that or maybe series. I hope my review will be helpful to people who are up to watch it . Just remember enjoy it and i really hope you will get the same feelings i got while watching it. I really hoped it will be more longer because i enjoyed it✨💕

The film begins with a quote from 1910, about Chile - something like: "the inequalities in this vast part of our country come from the past and many are still hapening today. Anyone with eyes can see them." From a book called, sinceridad. Chile íntimo en 1910, by. Alejandro Valdés Canje. The story and characters are fictional but the type of events depicted are unfortunately very common, down to the greenwashing window dressing. This is a messy, heart wrenching story, like reality, and it never turns away from the brutal reality. But some of the main characters are brave, persistent, and inspirational, which is also realistic. Regarding another story, a streaming series, my friend questioned whether a young girl could credibly have suddenly turned the tables on a dangerous adult mistreating her family. I responded with the example of Lana Turner's 14 year old daughter, who in 1958 stabbed to death a 32 year onld gangland enforcer who was abusing her mother. Personally, I have met incrediibly fearless and ferocious indigenous women in Canada, in connection with water and land defense actions.

After seeing the number of stars attached to the reviews I too had little hope of this movie being of any good. As one of the past commenters said, the movie really shows a truly potential situation and the plausible eventuality of events. However, I disagree with their view on the ending. I don't believe it could have ended any other way as it needed to show the futility of the situation.

Oh rats, there are a required number of characters needed for this review so I'm going to mumble on for a bit to ensure I can fulfill the requirements. Double rats, I'm still short!! So all in all, this was a good show that illustrated a new (to me) theme.