The Lord Worked Wonders in Me

As part of a project for the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona, Albert Serra and Lisandro Alonso agree to exchange filmed letters where both engage with characters and conceits from their previous works. Serra revisits Honour of the Knights (Quixotic) (LFF 2006), moving the cast and crew of the original film to the arid landscape of La Mancha, the original setting for Don Quixote’s adventures and misadventures. Between takes, Serra’s cast and crew watch, bicker, argue, eat and wait for Albert. There are echoes of Truffaut’s Day for Night in the appealing simplicity of Serra’s approach. The Lord Worked Wonders in Me, however, is more than just a film about filmmaking. Lyrical absurdism, an uncompromising cinematic vision and the attention to composition evidenced in his earlier features all combine to provide a commentary on 21st-century quest with earlier antecedents.