The Raft
All Films
•
1h 38m
Directed by Marcus Lindeen | 97 mins | 2018
In the summer of 1973, a young international crew of six women and five men embarked together on a most unusual sea voyage—a close-quarters trip across the Atlantic from Spain to Mexico on a free-floating raft christened the Acali, initiated by Mexican anthropologist Santiago Genovés, who proposed to use the group as guinea pigs in his investigation of the origins of violent conflict and dynamics of sexual attraction. Contentious from the get-go, incorrectly labeled by the media as ‘The Sex Raft,” the Acali mission stayed afloat for 101 days—and now, more than forty years later, the surviving crew members reunite to reenact and recollect their experience, additionally illustrated with extensive 16mm archival footage from the voyage. What results is a document of the thin line between science and cultism in the early ’70s, a touching story of female camaraderie and, in the character of Genovés, an unforgettable portrait of oblivious, toxic masculinity.
A Metrograph Pictures release.
Up Next in All Films
-
The Red House
Directed by Delmer Daves | 100 mins | 1947
A haunted house movie lauded for its strange and singular charms, this proto-Lynchian mystery conjures a feeling of horror within a quaint rural setting. Edward G. Robinson stars as Pete Morgan, an aging farmer who lives with his sister, Ellen, and their... -
The Reflecting Skin
Directed by Philip Ridley | 96 mins | 1990
A word-of-mouth sensation at Cannes, Philip Ridley’s debut feature is a macabre, magic hour-tinted work of Prairie Gothic—a Lynchian riff on “Days of Heaven,” spiked with intimations of the supernatural. Eight-year-old Seth Dove (Jeremy Cooper) becomes c... -
The Shadowless Tower
Directed by Zhang Lu | 144 mins | 2023
Rich in gently rhyming motifs, Zhang Lu’s 2023 Berlinale competition offering orbits a food and restaurant critic in Beijing. Middle-aged and listless in the aftermath of a divorce, Gu Wentong finds himself contemplating a reunion with the father he hasn’t s...
