/ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT/CINEMA-ARGENTINA: Provincial Film Competes at Berlin Festival

By Marcela Valente Reprint | | Print |

Marcela Valente

BUENOS AIRES, Feb 13 2001 (IPS) - The only Latin American feature- length film in competition at the prestigious Berlin Film Festival is the Argentine-made ‘La Ciénaga’ (The Marsh), but its director, Lucrecia Martel, says it does not represent her country, or even the region.

Nor does it characterise Salta, the province where she grew up and which is portrayed in the movie, and it is not the stereotype of “women’s film”.

“I don’t feel that my film represents Argentine cinema, which has so much diversity, or Latin American cinema, or women,” Martel commented before leaving for Berlin, where ‘La Ciénaga’ is competing with 22 other works at the festival known as the Berlinale, which runs Feb. 8-18.

Economic and financial globalisation may be accelerating, but in the cultural sphere, paradoxically, projects from the countryside or from the provinces are taking centre stage, as if it were there that the authentic traits of a less abstract humanity are found.

“I don’t feel I am doing anything more than representing my commitment to my own artistic work,” Martel said. ‘La Ciénaga’ is her first film and is allowing Argentine cinema to return to the Berlinale competition after a 13-year absence, when another film shot in the country’s interior (‘La deuda interna’ – The Internal Debt) was awarded the Silver Bear.

This year, in addition to showing 600 films in various thematic divisions, 23 feature films were selected to compete for the Golden Bear, the festival’s top prize. In addition to ‘La Ciénaga’, there are 13 movies from Europe, five from Asia, one from Africa (Senegal) and three from the United States.

At the Berlinale, which this year marks its 51st anniversary, there are usually productions from the commercial circuit (most from the US movie industry, concentrated in Hollywood), as well as others considered art films and Asian works.

South Korea, China and Japan have become the stars of film festivals in recent years, as there is greater interest in sharing new cultural experiences through a form of expression as unique and diverse as cinema.

Martel, 34, an unknown in her own country, shot the film in her home province of Salta, in northern Argentina. The story conveys the ambience of her country’s interior with great sensitivity.

The director states that her strongest influences include the stories her parents told her as a child. “With my brothers, we used to make fun of the way my mother told stories, because we never knew when they began or when they ended,” she recalled.

That style of telling a tale is reflected in ‘La Ciénaga’ – though it was not necessarily intended.

Martel affirms that she is not the typical film buff, as most new directors seem to be. Perhaps that is because she lived in a province far away from the cultural movements and film series available in Buenos Aires, for example.

But she did have the opportunity to begin her own filming experiences.

“When I was 19, my father bought a film camera, one of those heavy ones that you had to set up in a fixed location. I put it in the kitchen, where we spent the most time, and there I filmed what occurred between my mother and my siblings … I liked capturing what was happening in a somewhat covert way.”

Later, she moved to the Argentine capital, more than 2,000 km south of her hometown, and studied film and animation there. “But cinema is not my favourite thing. I took it on as a form of expression because I had some talent for it.”

Since then, Martel has stood out for some of her short films, especially for her scripts. Narration dominates once again.

Finally, after heading the artistic production of a television comedy show, she obtained backing to transform a story she had been working on into a feature-length film.

Martel called on two top actresses in Argentina: Mercedes Morán and Graciela Borges. The director says they generously accepted to participate in a first work in which the women – without makeup or any lighting tricks to hide the years – shine purely through their acting.

‘La Ciénaga’ has already begun its competition at the Berlinale. If Argentines want to see it, they will have to wait until the Women’s Film Festival in Mar del Plata, beginning Mar. 8, or until April, when it premieres in local theatres.

Meanwhile, Martel is passing unnoticed at a festival in Germany as spotlights shine on such stars of Hollywood films as Anthony Hopkins, Sean Connery, Kirk Douglas, Spike Lee and Kate Winslett. And the Argentine filmmaker is already enjoying working on her next film, ‘La santita’ (The Little Saint), a different view of life in a small town.