Scavengers, The

A post-war fable. A young man is sent by his mother to search for his sister, long since lost. He moves slowly from a rural to an urban environment. He experiences violence and absurdity and, due to his inability to see, to imagine, instigates the film’s central, ironic sequence. The film depicts the main character’s sense of loss and wonder at the world and his subsequent feeling of desperation. Simultaneously, one can perceive in the character of the young woman an ability to see alternatives, to see the possibility of change in her life. This imagination and its necessity for hope are the primary concerns of the film. Formally, the film’s stylized colours, optical printing and structure challenge traditional notions of narrative development, yet static framing and an attention to symmetry echo conventions found in the classic narrative cinema. “The Scavengers’” formalism is key to understanding its themes of imagination, wonder and loss.