Murder, Myths, and Medicine in the Amazon: Reflections of the Colombian Nation and State in Frontera verde (Green Frontier, 2019)

Resumen

This article analyzes the figure of the detective in the Colombian Netflix original series, Green Frontier (2019). Against the framework of a complex jungle space, the detective figure, victims, murderers, and accomplices each struggle with issues of identity and fragmentation. As the detective works to solve the crime, the people with whom she interacts comes to embody a binary relationship (indigenous/non-indigenous; female/male; traditional/Western medicine; oral/written tradition). As she collects evidence for the case, these boundaries are reconciled, and relationships emerge that reflect issues of State, Nation, foreign influences, and identity in contemporary Colombia.