There is magic and realism in spades in this iteration of Macondo

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There naturally are differences between the series adaptation of Gabriel García Márquez’s ‘One Hundred Years of Solitude’and the text. Apart from the series opening at the end of the novel, with the whirlwind, the carnivorous ants, and the bloodied, pregnant woman, there is Melquíades (Moreno Borja) drawing the ouroboros (a serpent eating its tail) that does not appear in the novel.

The ouroboros stands for eternity and the cyclical nature of things. Makers could have used them as a shorthand for the triumphs and tragedies of the ill-fated Buendía family. That most of the tragedies are brought on by the Buendía themselves is a cross they have to bear.

Márquez refused to sell the rights to his novel as he believed a film would not be able to do justice to its breadth. The novel incidentally uses only 422 pages to tell a story that changed world literature forever, as opposed to, say, the 1,024 pages Robert Galbraith/J. K. Rowling uses to tell a non-story in ‘The Ink Black Heart’!

This series adaptation has been created with the blessings of the Márquez family, per their wishes to have it filmed in Colombia and Spanish. After beginning with the end of the novel in silence, the famous opening lines of ‘One Hundred Years of Solitude’ring out, “Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.”

We go to the beginning, to the marriage of cousins, José Arcadio Buendía (Marco Antonio González Ospina) and Úrsula Iguarán (Susana Morales Cañas). Thanks to her mother’s disapproval and stories of their children being born with the tail of a pig, the marriage is not consummated till the death at a duel with Prudencio Aguilar (Helber Sepúlveda Escobar).

One Hundred Years of Solitude (Spanish)

Directors: Alex García López, Laura Mora

Cast: Claudio Cataño, Diego Vásquez, Marleyda Soto, Viña Machado, Loren Sofía

Episodes: 8

Runtime: 59 – 68 minutes

Storyline: A story spanning generations of a family and a nation that is equally blessed and cursed

Buendía and Úrsula with their friends leave their village to find a place where they can live as they want. They find a utopia after much wandering through swamps and jungle and Buendía calls the place Macondo after a dream. For a time Macondo is isolated from world events with the annual visit of the gypsies including Melquíades being their only contact with the outside world.

As Macondo prospers, the world comes calling, in the form of a magistrate, Apolinar Moscote (Jairo Camargo) and his seven daughters and later, election, soldiers, death, the church and the revolution. Buendía and Úrsula have three children (none born with the tail of a pig), Arcadio (Janer Villarreal), Aureliano (Claudio Cataño), who was born with his eyes open and goes to lead the revolution and a daughter, Amaranta (Loren Sofía).

There is also the beautiful Rebeca (Akima), Úrsula’s second cousin, who comes to stay with the Buendía family as a child carrying her parents’ bones in a bag. Amaranta and Rebeca are rivals for the love of Pietro Crespi (Ruggero Pasquarelli), the Italian musician, who comes to set up the pianola at the Buendía home and teach the girls dancing.

One Hundred Years of Solitude does not shy away from the unpalatable parts of the novel including incest, self-harm, and the fact that the only native characters are Visitacíon and her brother Cataure, from the Wayuu People, who work as house servants at the Buendía home.

The series is beautifully mounted, lit and scored. Whether it is Remedios (Cristal Aparicio) in the bath in the outdoors looking like a Pre-Raphaelite painting, José Arcadio on a raft like he is walking on water, Aureliano and Moncada (Salvador del Solar) playing chess by the sea, or the long shot encompassing the blue house, Aureliano, the dead dog and the woman bludgeoned to death, the frames bring Márquez’s mercurial prose alive in unexpected and comforting ways.

The sets are exquisitely dressed with lovely china and gorgeous furniture. The costumes are wonderful from the long skirts, frilled wide necks, flared shirt sleeves, and fitted trousers to Pilar Ternera’s (Viña Machado) stunning neckpieces and rings. Percussion instruments make up a sizeable chunk of the musical score ranging from pensive and quiet to sultry or military.

Diego Vásquez as the older José Arcadio Buendía, tied to a hoary chestnut tree, with his mind gone, and Marleyda Soto as the matriarch Úrsula, holding things together, shine in the acting department, where everyone gives an excellent account of themselves. The first part of One Hundred Years of Solitude ends with Aureliano and his rebel army getting ready to take over Macondo. The second part, also consisting of eight episodes, will hopefully tell the rest of the story including the coming of the railroad, the banana workers’ massacre and the wealthy Belgian aviator Gastón with his velocipede.

Though Netflix has not announced a date for Part 2, the episodes have already been shot. While we wait, we can take a pointer from the ouroboros to watch Part 1 again or read the book to see how “The first of the line is tied to a tree and the last is being eaten by the ants”, comes to be.

One Hundred Years of Solitude is currently streaming on Netflix

Published – December 21, 2024 03:35 pm IST