Some films stay with you because of what they tell you, and some because of the strange world they create around a very simple story. Sebastián Múnera's Meteorite belongs somewhere in between. It is a film about two women, a risky decision, and a journey that takes them through a landscape where the ordinary and the unsettling constantly exist side by side.
Tefa and Nia live together in a small town near Colombia's Magdalena River, raising Nia's young nephew and trying to make a living in circumstances where there isn't much room for comfort or stability. Their routine changes when Nia gets involved in a plan to smuggle mobile phones into a regional prison and brings Tefa along with her.
The premise could easily lead the film towards a conventional crime story, but Múnera is less interested in the mechanics of the operation than in the two women caught up in it. The journey gives us a closer look at their lives and at the relationship between them. Nia is more willing to take risks, while Tefa often seems less certain about the decisions being made. Yet she remains beside her, and that dynamic becomes increasingly important as the story progresses.
There is something quite grounded about the way Meteorite treats their circumstances. The decision to smuggle the phones does not feel like an elaborate criminal enterprise. It comes from a fairly basic need for money, which makes the situation more complicated than a simple distinction between right and wrong. The film allows these choices to exist without turning either woman into a hero or a villain.
Their journey eventually brings them to an amusement park built on the former estate of Pablo Escobar. It is an unusual setting, and Múnera makes full use of it. The bright colours, artificial attractions and playful atmosphere sit strangely against the history of the place. Rather than stopping the story to explain this contradiction, the film lets Tefa and Nia move through it, making the amusement park feel both ordinary and deeply unsettling at the same time.
The setting also brings a larger reality into the film without taking it away from its characters. Colombia's history of violence is present, but Meteorite does not become a film about Pablo Escobar or a direct examination of that history. It is more interested in how these women live in a country where such histories are part of the places around them. The past is simply there, sometimes in unexpected forms.
The film's visual style is one of its strongest features. Arlene Müller’s cinematography gives the film a distinctive look, particularly through its use of colour. The contrast between the more natural environments of Tefa and Nia's everyday life and the artificial brightness of the amusement park is striking. Múnera also has a strong sense of composition, often allowing the surroundings to occupy as much space as the characters.
Sound is used with equal care. Natural sounds and periods of silence are allowed to remain prominent, while the music occasionally arrives in unexpected ways. It gives the film a slightly unusual rhythm and prevents its quieter passages from feeling completely straightforward.
If there is a weakness, it lies in the narrative itself. The film occasionally feels loose, and some of its transitions and developments are less convincing than its visual choices. At times, the story seems to drift rather than build towards a clear dramatic point. But its strongest sections are confident enough to make that looseness feel secondary.
At its centre, Meteorite remains a story about Tefa and Nia and the circumstances that bring them onto this journey. Their relationship gives the film its structure, while the world around them adds layers of social and historical reality without overwhelming the story. Múnera combines an intimate character-driven narrative with an unusually vivid visual style, resulting in a film that is as interested in where these women are going as in the world they have to move through to get there.
