/ARTS WEEKLY/FILM-CHILE: Documentary to Stir Memories of Allende

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Patricia Moscoso

SANTIAGO, Jan 9 2003 (IPS) - Chilean filmmaker Patricio Guzmán is beginning work on a documentary about the former president Salvador Allende (1970-1973) nearly 30 years after the leftist leader’s death in during the coup d’état led by Gen. Augusto Pinochet.

"At the moment in which the documentary takes off, you are submerged in a sort of look inwards at your character, pondering what you would do. So the only thing I can tell you is that it is going to be a film about Allende that stirs our collective memory," Guzmán told IPS.

"I am going to ask many people – in the provinces, in the poor neighbourhoods – about the image they have of Salvador Allende, because I think that a biography is composed of objective data and also the myth," said the filmmaker.

Guzmán’s previous works include "La batalla de Chile" (The Battle of Chile), "La memoria obstinada" (The Obstinate Memory) and "El caso Pinochet" (The Pinochet Case).

The documentary will be filmed in Chile but produced in France, where Guzmán lives. It is slated to premiere simultaneously in Paris and New York on Sep 11, 2003, the thirtieth anniversary of the Pinochet-led coup.

The director admits that the deadline adds an additional dramatic ingredient to the filming. He says he does not like to work against time, even though he has been "turning this idea over and over for more than two years."

Furthermore, he notes that he has a great deal of work behind him because he filmed constantly during the Allende government, a period he considers "as rich as it was dramatic, and as fruitful as it was tragic."

Thirty years later, Guzmán believes enough time has passed to speak prudently, in images, about the president who is believed to have committed suicide at the presidential palace, La Moneda, as the Pinochet-led military bombarded it.

But the film is not limited to the three years of Allende was in power, because the socialist leader "began work in the public sphere at age 20," the director points out.

"I think he was the most political figure there has even been in Chile, in the sense that he served as government minister at 29 and was successively a candidate for congressional deputy and senator in the following years," commented Guzmán.

"He did not use political clientelism, but Allende always dared to compete in places where he wasn’t supposed to win. and he won. That turned him into a sort of political champion throughout his 50-year career," he explained.

Allende was Health minister under the Pedro Aguirre Cerda government (1938-1941), and as of 1952 he ran for president four times, finally winning in the Sep 4, 1970 elections as the candidate for the leftist Popular Unity coalition.

Guzmán’s résumé already includes three films on the short-lived Popular Unity government: "El primer año" (The First Year), "The Battle of Chile" (in two parts) and "The Obstinate Memory".

The director is not afraid that what some might consider a repetition will thwart his aim to document the life of Allende with a different view. Instead, he thinks the other films will help him, "because filming a period so intensely gives you enormous resources."

Nor is he afraid of confronting the power of so legendary a figure as the former Chilean president.

"I am full of doubts, about choosing what I should film, but I am not afraid of the Allende personality. On the contrary, it is an honour to be able to make a film about him because for my generation he represented hope, dignity and kept promises," he said.

"To make a documentary about those three concepts is extraordinary, without attempting to hide his stumblings or mistakes," the director added.

Guzmán believes the three value concepts have been transferred to the younger generations, one way or another.

Chilean youth and elderly alike "see Allende in a much more positive light than we think," he assured.

It is likely that part of Guzmán’s faith in the young population is due to the fact that in the last six years, since the annual Documentary Film Festival began, a new generation of filmmakers has emerged that is committed to recuperating Chile’s collective memory.

Among these new directors is Carmen Luz Parot, whose "Estadio Nacional" (National Stadium) recounts how various people realise how the sports arena in the Chilean capital turned into the worst of prisons during the first months of the Pinochet dictatorship that overthrew Allende.

Marcela Said has made a name for herself with her documentary "I Love Pinochet", delving into the psychology of those who support the now elderly former dictator.

In the most recent documentary festival, in November, the winner was Paula Rodríguez, with "Volver a vernos" (To See Each Other Again). The film traces the histories of three people who were children in 1973, the year of the coup, through their student activism of the 1980s and the conflicts of the democratic government of the 1990s.

Guzmán asserts that collective memory is not a fad, but rather is a foundation of modern civil society.

"Just as in the last 20 years we have incorporated concepts that were previously unknown, such as sexual tolerance, environmental preservation, racial tolerance, there is also the notion of memory. And it has arrived in Chile to stay," he said.