Wolfmother and the Dawn of Man

Wolfmother and the Dawn of Man is the second part in a series of videos about ritual as the remnant of a ‘sacred time’ (Eliade 1969) that has vanished before the imposition of a historical time in which all kinds of values are subsumed and reduced to the exchange value typical of capitalist ideology. In a vain attempt to recover a potential – a dynamis of indeterminate time in which forms remain fluid – by means of a fictitious reconstruction and mythologisation of universal origin myths, using the figure of ritual as the action of establishing a connection between the hic et nunc with an indefinite and meta-historical past, Wolfmother and the Dawn of Man is centred around the mother/child parental pair and its archetypal representations, as an allegory of a 'going out into the world' using the well-known initiation ceremonies, and whose conceptual node revolves around the figure of the hermaphrodite. The basic premise of the narrative can be summarised as the birth of man - masculine, although carrying the seeds of femininity - through his encounter (and eventual consumption of) with the maternal figure that leads to the integration of the gender binomial.Rummaging through the remnants of myths, symbols, and rituals that float like fragments in various aspects of contemporary society, the work can be considered as a mixture of ancestral and modern references that combine elements ranging from the Göktürk, Oedipical, Cretan and Aboriginal Australian ethnological myths, to vampirism, Hans Baldung’s The 3 Ages of Man and Death, the bizarre cinema of Kenneth Anger and Alexandro Jodorowsky, and a psychedelic rock band.

‘In the clearing of a forest, a child builds a labyrinth in which he gets enclosed with a monster who turns out to be his own mother, who ushers him to discover the truth about time, life, sex, death, and the transgression of moral boundaries that lead him to eventually become a man.’

A film by Derzu Campos
Cast: Sebastián Rojano, Alexis de Anda, Juventina García, Jesús Vazquez
Cinematrography: Alberto Ulloa
Camera assistant: Santiago Cassarino
Executive producers: Francisco Lerda, Mercedes Ascani, Ignacio Bazán
Producers: Montserrat Pérez Bonfil, Isela Mejia, Roberto Vilches
Art Director: Perla Castañón
Art Department: Gil Cienfuegos, Taina Campos
Editing: Derzu Campos, Adrià Campmany, Paulina Del Paso
Sound: Ariel Raguth, M31 Medios
Costume Designer: Pamela Maldonado
Makeup: Laura San Martín
Original Music: Juan Pablo Ramírez Ibánez, Derzu Campos
Casting: Montserrat Pérez Bonfil
A.D: Pablo Delgado, Montserrat Pérez
Key Grip & Electric: “Conejo” Herrera, “Scooby” Herrera
Camera provided by Cinecontraste
Still Photography: Ignacio Bazán Estrada
On set Doctor: Miriam Alcántara
Legal and Child rights and protection consultant: Luz García López De Pascoe

Special thanks to Revolution 435 D&C, Fernando Hernández, the communal ejidatarios from the Desierto de los Leones National Park Mexico, Dulce María García, José Ángel Campos, Cointya Kiabet, Gerardo Sosa, Iván López, and Yan Uren Vázquez.

Thanks to the crowdfunding backers without whom this project would not have been possible: María Dolores Aguayo, Argentina Aranda, Mercedes Ascani, Raymundo Báez, Ignacio Bazán, José Luis Camacho, Marcela Camacho, José Ángel Campos, Taina Campos, Ricardo Cárdenas, Marco Antonio Cuén, Mariano del Cueto, Elizabeth Ursic, Francisco Lerda, Irene Lizárraga, Dulce María García G. Lizárraga, Gabriela Gay, Montserrat Pérez, Adrià Sala, Alfonso Salgado, Cecilia Salgado, Inti Santamaría.

Additional thanks to Israel Rojano, Mayelli Osuna, Paulina del Paso, Alonso Escudero family, Carolina Vidal, Rubén Domínguez, Carlos Amorales, Galia Eibenschutz, Arturo Salgado, Víctor Muñoz, Lara Torri, Claudelia Jaber, Lucero Novaro, Marianne Costa, The Rietveld gang.

The integrity of the child involved was at all times ensured during the making of this film.

Made with the support of the National Fund for Culture and the Arts (FONCA), as part of Jóvenes Creadores grant; LCI seguros; and Cinecontraste.