La fiebre del oro
2017 · 25m · España
Directed by Raúl de la Fuente
Genres: documentary, drama
Tones: contemplative, melancholic
In Cabo Delgado, Mozambique, the poverty of the population and the wealth of the subsoil remain irreconcilable, taking the lives of hundreds of artisanal miners. Marcelino digs into the earth looking for ruby in a hole like the one in which his brother died; Toni works without rest in a mine where there is hardly any gold left.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
Everyone expects a righteous poverty doc here, but de la Fuente refuses the easy catharsis—instead he makes you sit with the irreconcilable fact that these men will keep digging anyway, which is weirder and more honest than the usual savior narrative.
A formally austere film that understands the tradition of humanist documentary while interrogating it; the measured pacing and refusal of score allow the contradiction between geological wealth and human destitution to become the film's own formal grammar.
The genius is the editing rhythm that mirrors the repetitive, endless labor—each cut feels like another shovelful—so that form doesn't comment on the subject but *becomes* it, which is why this 25 minutes feels like it weighs a ton.