The jungle: a summer swarm of insects, slivers of sunlight, and a leafy, overwhelming green. Los Muertos opens like a portrait of verdant nature, of the light and shadows of the tropical world, until its prowling camera discovers something more: the murdered bodies of two boys. With this startling scene, Lisandro Alonso opens his elegantly austere investigation of the boundaries between the natural world and the human-and the violence that lurks within them both. Jumping forward 20 years, the film shows the aging Vargas released from jail. Seemingly anxious to get lost, Vargas buys a canoe, visits a prostitute, then heads downriver. Shucking clothes and money along the way, he lets the jungle reclaim him. Los Muertos's refusal of easy explanations leads to a wealth of metaphorical interpretations: the isolation of Argentina; the path from guilt to absolution; ex-criminals reintegrating into society. But like Mexico's Japón or Thailand's Blissfully Yours, Los Muertos is a true motion picture. Luxuriating in the sensual sights and sounds of the tropics, its camera captures not still life, but an ever-moving one, filled with color and texture. The story can mean anything; what matters is the world that surrounds it, the one we all live in, but rarely take time to see.