Gabriel and the Mountain

The location photography does much of the film’s heavy lifting, especially visits to Mount Kilimanjaro and Mulanje’s Sapitwa Peak. (The rumor is that a young J.R.R. Tolkien visited there, and Barbosa leans into this a bit for the big finish.) The star of the show, however, is the dialogue between cultures.

More than a simple tribute or a fond remembrance, it is a remarkable and full-throated elegy, a work of art that is full of life.

Even if the proceedings sometime feel like a travelogue, the reconstructions of Gabriel’s last days alive, down to the exact locations and personal interactions, leave a strong impression.

Director Barbosa's love letter to his late friend is emotionally satisfying and cinematically splendid, with social commentary shoe-horned in for better or worse.

On one level, the film can be classified as a journey of discovery, but what deepens interest is the way Barbosa constantly asks the viewer to question what it means to travel.

Barbosa doesn’t seem very interested in questioning Buchmann’s intentions — the idea of cultural appropriation never comes up, for starters — with the young man depicted as sincere if clearly naive.

The film seems to think that the mere recognition of Gabriel as a narcissist sufficiently complicates the character's sense of entitlement.