Albert Serra: The Lord Worked Wonders in Me

Albert Serra, The Lord Worked Wonders in Me / El Senyor ha fet en mi Meravelles Spain 2011, video, colour, sound, 146 min

Lisandro Alonso, Untitled (Letter for Serra) / Sin título (Carta para Serra), 2011, colour, sound, 23 min

The Lord Worked Wonders in Me began as an attempt to rediscover the mythical landscapes of La Mancha from Cervantes’ Don Quixote. Together with the cast from Honour of the Knights, Serra and his crew arrived to discover the landscapes no longer existed and set about instead making work about the making or in this case un-making of a film. This unique film is part portrait of his collaborators and crew, part reflection on the changing landscapes of contemporary Europe.

The film was a chance for Serra to explore one of his underlying themes that of play and fun. As he has stated this element, the ‘ludic side of the way I work is hidden in my previous films because of their formalism, but it’s an important element for me: it’s why I decided to make cinema, for fun, to make a break with routine daily life, which is getting more mediocre all the time. Cinema was a way of escaping this. Cinema is a social art that creates a certain ambience; it’s work but there’s also the element of friendship and family.’