Melbourne IFF 2025: The Mysterious Gaze of the Flamingo (dir. Diego Céspedes) | Review

Scientists and researchers are still searching for a cure for AIDS, even with advances in medical technology, which highlights the obstacles posed by the virus’s structure and its rapid mutation. Beyond the cure, the awareness of the disease’s core reality remains taboo in many communities, where fear and misconceptions persist as powerful allies. Speaking of taboo, Céspedes arrives with a tale that carries the same aura, set in a diverse world where awareness comes at a hefty price.

The film does not echo the tone of Norman René’s Longtime Companion, but here the year is the 1980s, in a dusty mining town in Chile, where Lidia (Tamara Cortés), an eleven-year-old girl, lives happily with her queer family. Within the family there is a spirited sense of togetherness, yet the town opposes them at all costs for a troubling reason – a plague spreading through the community, blamed on Lidia’s queer relatives. It is said the plague strikes men who fall in love with one another, spreading through a single gaze. As Lidia watches her family circle unravel into suffocation, the fate of both herself and her loved ones becomes an open question, their future slipping further out of reach.

Céspedes examines how rural communities cope when fear is at its peak – with little exposure to proper knowledge, and folklore serving as a medium of survival. Queer residents, marked as outcasts, endure harassment and brutality as their lives are entangled in the mystery of the plague. Even as neighbors turn against one another through distrust and violence, Céspedes presents this backlash in an artistic manner, weaving song into the narrative to link fear and love as parallel forces seamlessly combined. This creates a new form of tenderness that calms the soul against a backdrop of hatred and oppression. Yet the screenplay also makes clear that there is always a hidden villain – a danger greater than any biological risk.

Céspedes’ exploration goes further, delving into the gap between love and gender prejudice, and the silent despair of those who find fleeting joy and deep loneliness amid the chaos. These moments are captured through the stellar performance of Matías Catalán as the flamenco, portraying a trans woman with fierce determination to uphold her life principles, adapting to her surroundings despite the unknown consequences of the plague.

Winner of the 2025 Un Certain Regard Award, The Mysterious Gaze of the Flamingo is a visceral yet immersive film that plunges us into two perspectives equally – the horrific power of misconception and bigotry, and the supremacy of love and affection in boundless forms. The film redefines freedom by confronting history with courage, fighting for basic human rights, and insisting on the spread of love as liberation. Yet its most haunting element lies in the many gazes exchanged by Lidia and her family, each one carrying the weight of both a glowing fighter and a suffocated martyr, resisting a deceitful world.