100 years of solitude coming to an end
You might as well burst the abscess directly: no, the series A hundred years of solitude from Netflix does not equal the eponymous novel by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, a true summit of contemporary literature. But what matters, in the end, since she didn’t have to reach the unattainable to succeed where almost no one else had yet tried. Obviously, adapting a work so rich (in themes and number of pages), moreover for the first time in history, required a lot of leave a little material aside to be able to correctly model everything else.
If it therefore loses its complexity, particularly political and anthropological, the story retains all its dreamlike power and its fierce prophetic and apocalyptic charge. We can even say that the series loses in nuance what it gains in pure symbolic force. This is the case from the first episode which, rather than opening with the execution of Colonel Aureliano Buendia (Claudio Cataño) and the famous incipit of the novel, first plunges into the heart of the ravaged village of Macondo and thus takes advantage of the possibilities and added value offered by the medium in relation to literature.
To seal the promise of a disastrous destiny, the camera stops on everything that will constitute the story to come, from its prologue to its epilogue: a family tree (with a pig-tailed child at the root), the peeling paint of a Saint, a drawing of Ouroboros, the corpse of a woman, an empty cradle, colonies of ants and a man alone in a laboratory. It is only after this presentation of all the stigmata of the Buendia family that the episode rewinds and a mysterious omniscient narrator comes into play.
Rather than the obvious which was gradually revealed to readers, it is therefore the fatality that immediately imposes itself on the spectatorsnow that the story of Garcia Marquez has gone around the world and the surprise and the unexpected have been dissected in every way. A hundred years of solitude lays his cards on the table by announcing the inexorable fall of the characters who, each time they try to thwart or ignore the curse that weighs on them, will only make it materialize.
This narrative bias is also reminiscent of the other television tour de force of the year: season 2 of House of the Dragon and the written tragedy of the Targaryens which share several points in common with the Buendias. But instead of dragons and other fantasy-related elements, it’s more the magical realism that tinges this gargantuan story.
HOUSE OF THE BUENDIA
Apart from the chronology, whose natural order is restored to avoid painful back and forths, the series remains faithful to the original novelrearranging or removing only a few details here and there for convenience. The events are therefore reproduced as imagined by the Colombian author, while the series finds the captivating and magnetic tone of the novel as well as its pervasive mysticism.
As in the original pages, the supernatural and the irrational invite themselves into the daily life of the Buendias, often through practical effects which make these phenomena paradoxically palpable. Beyond this balancing act between the fantastic and the factual, the tangible and the intangible, the series regains all the roughness of the book, without becoming indigestiblewhich is all the more commendable.
And A hundred years of solitude has long been deemed unadaptable, it is because the story has an incalculable number of quasi-eponymous characters spread over six generations, each more ambivalent and detestable than the last. The narration is elliptical, the phrasing is sometimes heavy and everything is done to blur the points of reference and make the readers lose track of time who often end up wandering in their turn in the streets of Macondo as the chapters scroll by and the web bottom comes unstitched. The book has no not intended to distract or entertain and this is where the series could have stumbled.
An experimental film can seek to push its audience to its limits, but for a series of eight episodes (over an hour each), the challenge of discomfort was totally crazy, not to say suicidal. Especially sinceno concessions were made to liven up or soften the storyin particular what concerns pedophilia and incest which serves as original sin.
The narration also remains vaporous and laconic, as if certain scenes were completely disconnected from previous ones and that nothing was ever guaranteed to arrive anywhere, except in a dead end. This more abstract feeling when reading is intelligently embodied on the screen in the corridors and aisles of the Buendias’ main house which becomes the scene of a carefully choreographed ballet which plays with the entrances and exits of the protagonists.
The rhythm, for its part, is both haunting (thanks to the unity of place, the deep voice and the slow diction of the narrator) and infernal, each episode being an uninterrupted flow of events which leave little respite to the characters and the spectators. A hundred years of solitude is not the kind of series to binge-watch, at the risk of quickly wanting to change the program. However, it requires lock yourself in an airtight bubbleto immerse yourself as much as possible and not take your eyes off the screen to dive into the interstices of this demanding story which does not give the viewer anything to worry about after the first episode.
However, the sequel promises to be even more sinuous and destabilizing (and therefore great). The first season stops approximately halfway through the novel and closes a first cycle which serves as a basis for the story. From there, the series should plunge into an even more second state, with characters who will only be the distorted reflections of their elders, whose names, personalities, deep solitude and destinies voluntarily merge until what Macondo becomes the desolate village that we discovered at the very beginning of the season.
ECONOMIC REVOLUTION
The series is not only an incredible exercise in adaptation, it is also a beautiful television object with cinematographic ambitions. In addition to the photography of Paulo Perez and Sarasvati Herrera which supports its artificial sunshine to reinforce the ambient dreaminess, we must salute the colossal work to erect Macondo (built almost entirely for the occasion) and represent its different stages of evolution, limiting the use of green funds as much as possible.
The immersion is striking, both for the furniture that looks like it came from a museum and the outfits of the inhabitants who adapt to each era and social advancement. For those who have imagined the place and its smallest details throughout the pages and kept it in the back of their minds, this realization is almost moving.
Even if we do not yet know its budget, the series has resources, and it shows on the screen, in particular for certain passages which emerge as winners from this transposition such as the arrival of the conservative army and the human chaos that she carries with her. As for the Spanish-speaking cast, the majority is unknown to Western audiences, but remains a great discovery, in particular the senior couple of Marleyda Soto and Diego Vásquez who embody with poignant accuracy these two colossi with feet of clay.
In many ways, the series directed by Alex Garcia Lopez and Laura Mora Ortega is therefore a small miracle that would have deserved to be highlighted more by the platform. However, we will “only” give 4 stars to this almost impeccable first season, for the simple pleasure of leaving the second with the possibility of getting 4.5.
Season 1 of One Hundred Years of Solitude has been available since December 11, 2024 on Netflix in France
Related News :