Manuel Betancourt Hundreds of fish lie dead on a riverbed. A lone (lonely?) cow ambles around late at night in a forest. A flock of birds fly in discordant unison up above. The arresting images of nature gone awry in Francisca Alegría’s “The Cow Who Sang a Song Into the Future” are but the first clues that this rural-set Chilean feature has a distinct ecological interest. This hypnotic tale about how hard it can be to heal earthly and familial wounds marks a singular feature debut from the director of 2016 short “And the Whole Sky Fit in the Dead Cow’s Eye.” Aptly matching its dizzying and obfuscating title, the film opens with a premise that owes much to Latin America’s most treasured literary genre: magical realism. A young woman, with a motorcycle helmet in tow, emerges from the river where she presumably committed suicide decades ago. She washes ashore only slightly disoriented, caring little for the muddied state she’s in. Audiences, who have been offered an extended view of the verdant landscape around this mystery woman, including of the many fish who will soon be found dead in her wake, have heard a choral song that elucidates (though doesn’t quite clarify) what’s happened: “We’ve lived in agony since she passed away,” the voices sing, “but a drowned woman will come back soaked with life. And like her, we will return one day.” Alegría puts us immediately in a world where spirituality and ecology co-exist, where haunting presences have tangible connections with the physical realm.
