Courtesy of Kino Lorber

Presented by writer-director Jayro Bustamante

Mesmerizingly beautiful, Ixcanul captures a disappearing way of life and people. Teenage María lives with her family at the base of an active volcano. They are hardworking, Kaqchikel-speaking Mayans, harvesting coffee beans for a Spanish-speaking overseer to whom María is promised in marriage. But she yearns for someone else: Pepe, who dreams of leaving the village and traveling to “the other side of the volcano” (the United States). When these two come together one evening, their union has tragic consequences.

This brilliant debut by Jayro Bustamante examines the customs and traditions of the film’s indigenous characters in a dream-like manner. The final scenes, which reveal the bureaucracy and lack of humanity that Spanish-speaking Guatemala demonstrates toward indigenous cohabitants, touch on the timely subject of human trafficking.