News

Rodrigo Prieto is an acclaimed cinematographer known for his frequent collaborations with Alejandro González Iñárritu and Martin Scorsese. Most recently, he was nominated for an Oscar for his work on Scorsese’s ‘Killers of the Flower Moon’. Now, he has returned with his directorial debut, ‘Pedro Paramo, ‘ which is now streaming on Netflix. The film is based on Juan Rulfo’s same-name novel and it premiered at the 2024 TIFF. It is a magic realist fable mapping the life of the titular character mainly through the eyes of his son. Prieto presents multiple fantastical scenes that feel wonderfully mystical on their own. However, when put together, they do not form anything remotely coherent. So, here’s me trying to make sense of its confusion.

Spoilers Ahead

Pedro Paramo (2024) Plot Summary & Movie Synopsis:

‘Pedro Paramo’ on Netflix follows Juan Preciado travelling to Comala to honour his mother’s last wish to meet his estranged father,...

Mexican cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto has been plying his creative trade in Hollywood for over two decades. His notably instrumental camerawork can be seen in most of Martin Scorsese’s latest works and Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie.” For his directorial debut, Prieto, however, follows in the footsteps of his earlier collaborator, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu. “Pedro Paramo” (2024) is a landmark novel in Latin American literature. One that influenced Gabriel Garcia Marquez to create another, relatively popular, landmark literary work, “One Hundred Years of Solitude.” The novel is one of the early proponents of the artistic phenomenon known as “Magic Realism.”

In “Pedro Paramo,” Juan Preciado (Tenoch Huerta) travels to the abandoned ruins of what once was a bustling town called Comala. Juan was conceived in this place, as this is the place where his father, the eponymous Pedro Paramo (Manuel Garcia Rulfo), lived and ruled. Pedro abandoned Juan’s mother, Dolores (Ishbel Bautista). On her deathbed,...

Magical realism meets a grand family saga in “Pedro Páramo,” the directorial debut of cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto. As the man responsible for lighting and lensing countless renowned films — including “Barbie,” “Killers of the Flower Moon” and “Brokeback Mountain” — Prieto brings a keen eye to one of Mexico’s most influential novels. A tale of ghosts and memories that slips through time, Mateo Gil’s screenplay follows the structure of Juan Rulfo’s 1955 text with stringent fidelity, laying the groundwork for a melancholic (if slightly imbalanced) adaptation that finds visual splendor in the macabre.

Tenoch Huerta (“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”) plays Juan Preciado, a man who travels to his late mother’s hometown of Comala sometime after the Revolution (1910-20), in search of the father he never met: a figure named Pedro Páramo (Manuel García Rulfo), who he quickly learns has died as well. The missing figure’s name is often spoken in full,...