‘Los Puesteros’ is a poetic long-form multiplatform documentary project that explores the intimate world of some of the last country men of Chilean Patagonia, as they continue to live their isolated lives amidst the encroaching changes of the modern world. Their interweaving stories reveal a complex and intimate portrait of a forgotten people on the brink of disappearing. Pulling back the stoic curtain on their culture, reveals the reality of men suffering from severe mental health issues due to decade-long isolation, worries about climate change, fear of retirement and financial security. But it also shows resilient individuals, who overcome the reality of their fading identity with dignity and pride. These men not only deal with loneliness, but with existential questions of purpose, belonging and ownership as well. In a world that becomes more and more connected, the younger generation in this southern region of Chilean Patagonia no longer find the necessity or desire to pursue a life on the land, instead opting to follow ambitions of big city living or moving into ‘gaucho tourism’ and thereby breaking a generational cycle of farm life. As a result of these rapid social, cultural and economic changes, most gauchos constantly shift between embracing and resisting the inevitability of change, which creates a complex internal dialogue, that questions their relationship to country, nature, and tradition, and essentially meditate on a world moving too quickly to keep up with.
