At first glance, Augusto Gongora (a prominent journalist and cultural commentator) and Paulina Urrutia (an actress and former culture minister) have the kind of love any of us hopes to have in our old age. The Chilean couple make each other laugh and dance together in the sunny home they built; even after 25 years, they are still smitten.
This tender and playful dynamic remains even as Augusto struggles with memory loss. Eternal Memory begins with Augusto waking up to Paulina warmly reminding him of who he is and who she is. Even in this interaction, Paulina giggles and Augusto repeats her name back to her with a flirty smile.
It isn't until later in the film that we learn that Augusto has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's, and, throughout the many jumps in time, the audience can't ever really predict how present or forgetful Augusto might be in the next scene. Eternal Memory underscores how caring for someone with Alzheimer's is a practice of love, but it doesn't sacrifice its honest depiction of the incredible pain and loss involved in the diagnosis. We see Paulina impressively poised as she looks after her husband, filling in the gaps in his identity despite the decline in his health, but we also see her break down and grieve at other moments.
In one heartbreaking scene, Paulina cries to Augusto as she recounts that he didn't remember who she was all morning. He pulls her in for an embrace and reassures that it will never happen again. Director Maite Alberdi succeeds at showing us the hard-to-manage sides of Alzheimer's while avoiding reducing Augusto and Paulina's relationship to a caregiver-patient dynamic. Rather, she shows how love and humour persist even as the disease progresses.
More than simply Alzheimer's, this is a film about life and the value of memory. Central to the film is a reflection on Augusto's career as a TV journalist, when he extensively documented Pinochet's dictatorship in Chile with underground newscasts. When watching footage from this time, Paulina inquires if Augusto remembers José Manuel Pararda (asking him directly, "They slit his throat, remember?") and he chokes up, remembering the way his friend was murdered by the regime. It's an example of how Paulina takes on the enormous task of knowing and reminding Augusto of his personal history, parallel to what Augusto did for his beloved Chile during his career.
In another particularly striking scene late into Augusto's battle with Alzheimer's, Paulina reads a note he left her in the first book he wrote early in their relationship: "Those who have memory, have courage, and are sowers like you." The exchange showcases the irony and relentless cruelty of Alzheimer's; he spent his career fighting to preserve the nation's collective memory, only to lose his own.
The film jumps between eras, with shots of a moustachioed Augusto with his young children before the pair met, the couple's early days together, and after his diagnosis, creating a close portrait of the couple without a lot of narrative structure. This lends itself to the way we learn pieces of the pair's history simultaneously as Augusto loses pieces of his ability to remember it. Some of the footage is out of focus, shot by Paulina using a tripod as they isolated themselves during the pandemic, making the interactions we witness feel all the more private and intimate.
Augusto Gongora died in May 2023, just months after the film's Sundance premiere, where it won the Grand Jury Prize for World Cinema Documentary. While Eternal Memory displays the pain in his decline from Alzheimer's, it also celebrates what is possible in a life. In this way it is much more than a love story; it's a marvel of all that memory can store, and a testament to the individual's role in collective memory.
(MTV Documentary Films)This tender and playful dynamic remains even as Augusto struggles with memory loss. Eternal Memory begins with Augusto waking up to Paulina warmly reminding him of who he is and who she is. Even in this interaction, Paulina giggles and Augusto repeats her name back to her with a flirty smile.
It isn't until later in the film that we learn that Augusto has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's, and, throughout the many jumps in time, the audience can't ever really predict how present or forgetful Augusto might be in the next scene. Eternal Memory underscores how caring for someone with Alzheimer's is a practice of love, but it doesn't sacrifice its honest depiction of the incredible pain and loss involved in the diagnosis. We see Paulina impressively poised as she looks after her husband, filling in the gaps in his identity despite the decline in his health, but we also see her break down and grieve at other moments.
In one heartbreaking scene, Paulina cries to Augusto as she recounts that he didn't remember who she was all morning. He pulls her in for an embrace and reassures that it will never happen again. Director Maite Alberdi succeeds at showing us the hard-to-manage sides of Alzheimer's while avoiding reducing Augusto and Paulina's relationship to a caregiver-patient dynamic. Rather, she shows how love and humour persist even as the disease progresses.
More than simply Alzheimer's, this is a film about life and the value of memory. Central to the film is a reflection on Augusto's career as a TV journalist, when he extensively documented Pinochet's dictatorship in Chile with underground newscasts. When watching footage from this time, Paulina inquires if Augusto remembers José Manuel Pararda (asking him directly, "They slit his throat, remember?") and he chokes up, remembering the way his friend was murdered by the regime. It's an example of how Paulina takes on the enormous task of knowing and reminding Augusto of his personal history, parallel to what Augusto did for his beloved Chile during his career.
In another particularly striking scene late into Augusto's battle with Alzheimer's, Paulina reads a note he left her in the first book he wrote early in their relationship: "Those who have memory, have courage, and are sowers like you." The exchange showcases the irony and relentless cruelty of Alzheimer's; he spent his career fighting to preserve the nation's collective memory, only to lose his own.
The film jumps between eras, with shots of a moustachioed Augusto with his young children before the pair met, the couple's early days together, and after his diagnosis, creating a close portrait of the couple without a lot of narrative structure. This lends itself to the way we learn pieces of the pair's history simultaneously as Augusto loses pieces of his ability to remember it. Some of the footage is out of focus, shot by Paulina using a tripod as they isolated themselves during the pandemic, making the interactions we witness feel all the more private and intimate.
Augusto Gongora died in May 2023, just months after the film's Sundance premiere, where it won the Grand Jury Prize for World Cinema Documentary. While Eternal Memory displays the pain in his decline from Alzheimer's, it also celebrates what is possible in a life. In this way it is much more than a love story; it's a marvel of all that memory can store, and a testament to the individual's role in collective memory.