Told through the eyes of Lana, who has grown up at a zoo in Jakarta, POSTCARDS FROM THE ZOO is a film that begins much like a documentary, observing the running of the zoo and the people that live there. However, Lana’s surreal experiences of meeting a magical cowboy and being taken out into the city reminds us that this is very much fiction.
The title is perhaps the most apt that it could be; the film moves through the world in a series of snapshots, strung together with a loose narrative structure. At times, the contrast between scenes is so great you might think that one film has been edited into another or a different story segment. Although bizarre, there is a playfulness and beauty, especially in the interaction between the humans and the animals. The film builds an atmosphere with fantastic photography and a meandering, deliberate pace.
One might consider where the real animals live, as the zoo is always peaceful, quiet and humane compared to the crowded, dirty and sinful world outside
Indeed, the world outside the zoo is portrayed in a very different light to that within the zoo. One might consider where the real animals live, as the zoo is always peaceful, quiet and humane compared to the crowded, dirty and sinful world outside. The view of the outside world is very much seen through the eyes of the innocent Lana, always at arm’s length, unreal and not as dark as it might be – reverting back to the images of the animals that she loves.
In many ways it is not the most compelling viewing, but certainly an engaging and even mesmerising experience and not like anything that you’ve seen before.
The world that, as I sought to suggest in my review, I was most reminded of by Postcards from the Zoo is Strindberg’s A Dream Play, from his Inferno period: I may have said Indira, but I meant Indra, whose daughter Agnes comes to Earth.