Nisimazine Abu Dhabi
مجلة تصدرها نيسي ماسا ـ الشبكة االوربية للسينما الشابة
2011 أكتوبر17 الثالثاء- 5 العدد
A Magazine by NISI MASA, European Network Of Young Cinema
#5, Tuesday 18 October 2011
from The Tiniest Place by Tatiana Huezo
نيسيمازين
Tatiana Huezo تاتيانا هيوزو Dark Horse الحصان االسود Position Among the Stars مكان بين النجوم
ا فتتا حية// editorial
NISIMAZINE ABU DHABI
Tuesday 18 October 2011/# 5 A magazine published by the NISI MASA in the
by Ali Shujaa Al Afeefi
framework of a film journalism workshop
علي شجاع العفيفي مازالت امامنا خمسة أيام تفصلنا عن نهاية مهرجان واذا لم تكن لديكم الدراية،أبوظبي السينمائي : فال تقلقوا،الكافية عن الفعاليات القادمة للمهرجان ان ُكتاب «نيسيمازين» متواجدون في اروقة المهرجان من اجل ان يقدموا لكم أخر المستجدات عن فعاليات واالخرى الخاصة باأليام القادمة لترشدكم وتقنن،اليوم اضافة،متعتكم بمشاهدة النصوص العربية والعالمية .الى الندوات واللقاءات والنشاطات الموازية فعلى سبيل، هناك الكثير من الفعاليات،اليوم المثال هناك لقاء متعمق مع المخرجة تاتياناهويزو من المكسيك تتحدث فيه عن آخر أفالمها الوثائقية إلى ذلك ال تفوتوا الجلسات المحورية.»«أصغر مكان رجل:المعمقة التي تنظم تحت عنوان»نجيب محفوظ وهي حلقة نقاش تسلط الضوء عن إنجازاته،»السينما في السينما المصرية والروايات العربية؛ عالوة على ذلك .سيتم نشر كتاب عضده مهرجان أبوظبي السينمائي » ال تفوتوا مشاهد فيلم «المدينة،وفي السياق ذاته الذي يعرض ضمن برنامج خاص،للمخرج يسري نصر اهلل يحمل عنوان»خرائط الذات» مختص بالتعريف باألفالم ويقام هذا البرنامج للمرة.القديمة التي تم ترميمها وما.الثانية على التوالي ضمن المهرجان أبوظبي عليكم سوى العودة الى الصفحات االخيرة في هذه ، على سبيل المثال.المطبوعة للوقوف على التفاصيل الصورة الشخصية للمخرج المغربي هشام لعسريالتي تبرز حرفيته السينمائية التي تجسدت بقوة في باكورة .»اعماله الروائية «النهاية
for young film journalists from Europe and the Arab World with the support of
Only five days left of the 5th edition of Abu Dhabi Film Festival. If you don’t know enough what’s coming next, don’t worry! Nisimazine journalists are here to give you the latest updates on today’s events, and will still be present the next few days with new issues to guide you. Today many events take place at the festival. We would suggest you not to miss this afternoon’s master class at 2:30 p.m. about ‘Naguib Mahfouz: Man of Cinema’, a panel discussion which highlights the writer’s achievements in the Egyptian cinema. The event will serve to launch a book about Mahfouz, published by ADFF. Besides this don’t miss El Madina, a film under the special program called ‘Mapping Subjectivity’, which shows films that have been restored. This program is being held for the second time in a row at the Abu Dhabi Film Festival in cooperation with the Museum of Modern Art of New York.
the Abu Dhabi Film Festival
هيئة التحريرEDITORIAL STAFF ماثيو داراس:المدير المسؤول Director of Publication Matthieu Darras مارجه ألدرس:التصميم الفني/رئيس التحرير Editor-in-Chief/Layout Maartje Alders جي وايسبيرغ و زياد الخزاعي:المشرفان TutorS Jay Weissberg
Ziad Khuzai المساهمون في العدد
علي, نينو كلينجر,محمد بشير, زياد عبد الصمد جبهة,ميغيل فرنانديز فلوريس, شجاع العفيفي التحرير الشريط السينمائي Contributors to this issue
Ziad Abdul Samad, Nino Klingler Miguel Fernandez Flores Ali Shujaa Al Afeefi Mohamed Beshir, Celluloid Liberation Front Filippo Zambon
NISI MASA 99 rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis Among others, this issue features two encounters with talented directors: one with Moroccan Hicham Lasri whose The End is part of the New Horizons Competition; the other with Mexican Tatiana Huezo present in Abu Dhabi with her latest documentary The Tiniest Place.
75010, Paris, France Phone: +33 (0)9 60 39 63 38 europe@nisimasa.com www.nisimasa.com
Many things to do and not enough time… But don’t worry; check out our next issues to learn more the Abu Dhabi Film Festival program this year!
فيليبو زمبون:صورة
BY MARTINA LANG (AUSTRIA)
,
picture of the day / صورة اليوم
by Filippo Zambon
Asma’a
review / عرض نقدي
Amr Salama, Egypt - New Horizons
A story based on true events of a woman in her mid-40’s suffering from HIV and an inflamed gallbladder, trying her best to save some money not only for her treatment but also for her family. Coming from a simple background, Asma’a was living in a village and selling carpets until the day comes that changes everything. The mother had to make a sacrifice to raise her daughter, and what makes it worse, just when the cost of living is very high in the city, she is fired illegally from her job because she carries the HIV virus. The film highlights and emphasizes the corruption of the health care system in Egypt, and the harassment facing women every single day on the streets.
Dark Horse
Todd Solondz, USA - Narrative Competition
One scene has stuck in my mind: when Asma’a was in the hospital just seconds before the surgery, the doctors stop after she declares that she has AIDS. She is thrown out of the hospital and rejected by every other hospital; this act stresses the violation of human rights. As the director Amr Salama said: “The hidden connection between the film and current events that are happening in Egypt now is silence: we all are afraid of the society, and to show our power, that is a big problem in Egyptian society. It’s the same thing happening to the character in the film when she decides to stand up and show her power; the postproduction of the film finished one day before the revolution started.” Ali Shujaa Al Afeefi
Tuesday 18/10 VOX 2 - 3:30 PM
Dark Horse is about Abe, a fat, balding, middleaged loser who still lives with his rich parents and works in his dad’s business. He collects action figures and drives a wicked yellow Hummer H3, like the ones you see here on the Corniche sometimes. The lead role is played by Jordan Gelber, who judging by his performance will soon have a photograph on his Wikipedia page since Dark Horse is a gem of a movie by writer-director Todd Solondz and will probably be a commercial success as well. The basic storyline is such that, if you replace Abe with a teenager and he becomes an American Idol at the end, you have a Hollywood fairytale. But Abe, who wears a bling pendant that says “Dark Horse”, grows up to hit his mid-30s in the same restrictive protective glasshouse that existed in his childhood, only now the glass is thicker. Dark Horse may not be as dark as any of Solondz’s earlier works, I still have a problem with it being labeled as a “dark comedy”. The plot is altogether depressing even though it lightens up occasionally. The meanings of success and failure, as defined by society and the people around Abe, are smudged. In the end, Abe’s success/failure also depends on the viewer. Abe’s dreams form the crux of a movie which incorporates James-Bond fantasies into his struggle with the incoherence and selfishness around him and his need for love. The dreams look real and can often be mistaken for the narrative itself. Jordan Gelber’s performance is spell-binding, as he effortlessly merges into a child in so-called grown-up situations and becomes a man
in ones that matter. The complex relationships of Abe add another dimension. His mum loves him without understanding, like nursing a sickly child. His father tries to be supportive and instead turns out to be unforgiving. The woman he wants to marry terms him a failure and makes sure he knows it Dreamlike situations coldly reflect the fault lines in today’s socio-economic conditions. Abe brings a receipt for the toy he wants to exchange and the toy store manager replies everybody has a receipt. Everyone in society has the right to get assistance, but there is not enough to go around. Abe is constantly reminded to seek medical help as a cure for his unhappiness. As in Dostoyevsky’s famous novel, Abe who thinks and acts differently according to accepted middle-class ideology (“100 years too late” according to one of the lines in the movie) is an idiot. by Ziad Abdul Samad N.B.: One serious flaw that will not be looked upon lightly at the ADFF is that Makhmoud (with a ‘kh’), supposedly from Dubai, definitely looks more like an Indian technician than an Arab sheikh. Maybe this is Todd being ironic, taking a swipe at the know-it-all ‘artist’ who is in love with him.
Tuesday 18/10 ADT - 3:15 PM
FOCUS / بقعة ضوء
The evolution of an indonesian family
Position Among the Stars Leonard Retel Helmrich - Netherlands - Documentary Competition With the last part of his trilogy about the life of the Sjamsuddin family, Leonard Retel Helmrich concludes nothing less than a filmic monument. Over a period of about 12 years, Helmrich followed the lives of Grandmother Rumidjah, Uncle Bakti and his little niece Tari as their lives were exposed to the never-ending metamorphosis of a society in turmoil. Torn between Jakarta and the countryside, Christianity and Islam, Dictatorship and Democracy, Indonesian traditions and (post-) modern Capitalism, the Sjamsuddin family became the prism through which Helmrich peeks in order to unfold the contradictions and complexities of modern Indonesia.
Childhood: Stand van de zon
ancestors still haunt her: once she wakes up from a bad dream and grandmother Rumidjah assures her that this was her great-auntie who came to pay a visit. These are troublesome times: Rioting in the streets, the poverty-stricken population demands change and the right of participation. During the time of shooting, dictator Suharto steps down, and society does not yet know where to turn. Dirty times, with people fighting for small sacks of rice, beggars tumbling through in the middle of the highway looking for some charity, and a camera that apparently never gets cleaned. A dirty lens looking onto a shaken-up world.
Welcome to the playground of images! Here, the hunt for a rattlesnake turns into a scene of primordial confrontation between man and beast, a train journey offers millions of angles to feel the speed and the danger of falling down, and a simple conversation lets the camera shoot through space, from closeup to long shot to detail and back and forth. Helmrich says about his takes that he always tries to infuse a narration into them: a begin-
As diverse as the trilogy’s topics are, as megalomaniacal as its scope, so daring is its visual style. Through his incredibly flexible and mobile camerawork, Helmrich’s images interact with their subjects and the environment up to a level of aeshetization and immediacy that is normally associated with fiction films. The trilogy is a celebration of the camera as total subjectivity, participating in this life as much as human beings do. It is a visual spectacle, a real-life soap opera like nothing ever seen before.
ning, middle and end. The shots of the trilo-
Form and content are totally inseparable here, and they should be treated as a unity. It is a tense unity, often equivocal, often cacophonic - just like life in Indonesia.
for-nothing, betting on animal fights, getting
gy’s first instalment narrate a celebration of movement, of roaming in space, and of trying out everything even at the cost of a victory of style over substance. If the camera is really the “translator of all movement” (as French thinker Deleuze once wrote), then Helmrich speaks
Primary School: Stand van de maan The times of childlike, hyperactive experimentation are over. Though still jumping around like a sack of fleas, the images cool down, and a will to actively dramatize emerges. The narration of the shots and of the scenes is now under stricter control. Moments of fictionalisation appear, with techniques such as the superimposition of scenes from a house on fire onto the face of sleeping Bakti. The boundaries between dream and reality become permeable, as do those between documentary and fiction.
all languages: he can extract movement from virtually anything, from human bodies and animals, from trains, cars, rickshaws and motorcycles, from water, steam and smoke. Hop onto the train of life… … and meet the family. The first movie is about getting to know each other. Grandmother Rumidjah was still raised in the countryside, and she often seems lost in the beehive of people that is Jakarta. Her son Bakti is a gooddrunk all the time. And little Tari, who lost her real parents and now lives with these two as
The second part is by far the most erratic of the
a patchwork-family: she will be the charac-
three. The camerawork is intuitive, the editing
ter whose evolution most literally displays
associative, and it feels like Helmrich does not
the changing of Indonesia. The spirits of the
yet fully comprehend where his style will lead
him. He constructs relations through editing
a masterpiece, the document of a director
cafés and beauty ads lining the streets. In the
that sometimes makes sense, sometimes
mastering a form. Helmrich draws conclu-
countryside, the population is aging. The Isla-
seems arbitrary. It’s a trying-out of different
sions and streamlines the methods: the
mists demand the Sharia. Everything is hap-
combinations, with no unifying idea.
playfulness of part 1 meets the controlling
pening at the same time, everything seems
dramatization of part 2. The celebration of
connected, and every connection is valuable.
Everything gets relative in the lives of the
mobility does not feel like showing off any-
Indonesia is a space of unthinkable narrative
Sjamsuddins. One by one all family members,
more, but reflects what is going on in Indo-
richness, of motives flowing about waiting to
once Christian, turn towards Islam. Bakti fol-
nesia: the hyperworld of Capitalism came
be picked.
lows his older brother and converts to marry
and with it the acceleration of a society. The
a Muslim woman. Grandmother Rumidjah
insecurity of part 2 gave way to a speed of
Here, Helmrich’s style can finally flourish,
feels isolated in the bustling Islamic metro-
movement that knows only one direction. As
embracing the intensities and contradictions
polis and decides to return to the countrysi-
if one would like to guard oneself from peril
of this life, celebrating every single shot and
de. And little Tari, now a schoolgirl, is still too
by just keeping on running.
every potential montage combination. Stand van de sterren is a movie which takes parts
young to understand what is going on, but nevertheless she feels the change. When she
Tari has become the most self-indulgent ver-
out of reality, and does so deliberately to tell
finally realizes that their trip to the country
sion of a teenager one could imagine. It’s all
stories. It is neither documentary nor fiction,
will be a farewell form her beloved granny,
about mobile phones, karaoke with the girls,
because the two do not contradict each other.
she bursts into tears. It is the pain of letting
and watching the boys doing tricks on their
Instead, they belong to each other. They have
go that which you got used to, the old life.
motorcycles. But all hopes rest on her: she
to be fused into one, writing the storybook
must go to University, master the situation
of some out of all the potential stories of life.
Indonesia is in transition. Bakti walks over a
and find a way out of the misery, for her en-
Good luck, Indonesia!
high bridge and could fall down any second.
tire family and also for Indonesia. Uncle Bakti
The society takes its first steps into modern
(now neighbourhood manager but still addic-
democracy, and the outcome is yet unclear.
ted to gambling) cannot handle her anymore,
Will the people manage to construct the big-
so Grandmother has to come back from the
gest Islamic democracy of the world?
countryside. But she too is unable to keep
Adolescence:
By Nino Klingler
track with the speed of change, and cannot connect to her beloved grandchild. Nobody
Stand van de sterren
wants to go to church with her, where she sits
The last part is where everything comes to-
Indonesia now bears all the signs of a Wes-
gether. Without exaggeration: this movie is
tern country, with shopping malls, internet
and sings with the aging Christians.
Screening times Tuesday 18/10 VOX 8 07:30 PM Friday 20/10 VOX 8 06:45 PM
interview / مقابلة photo by Filippo Zambon
Hicham Lasri Director of The End, Morocco New Horizons
A parking attendant with a chained girlfriend, a gang of post-apocalyptic thugs roaming the streets of Casablanca, the “system’s pit bull”… Hyperrealism meet abstract experimentation to deliver a unique view of the Moroccan city far from the stereotypes of benevolent stories. It’s the work of Hicham Lasri whom we met to find out more about his unconventional vision. The most striking feature of your film is the very realistic setting matched by an almost science-fictional atmosphere and highly stylized photography. What motivated this approach? I wanted to talk about the death of the king, which was a defining moment for me personally and for the country since the king was this fatherlike figure that people simultaneously loved and hated. At the same time I didn’t want to be judgemental about it, to be political about it; it was more about the feel of that moment, of that
to its essential components, so I cut dialogues, I did not use any music. I wanted to go somewhere else, not following the conventional grammar of cinema. It was a Sufi-kind of approach to cinema, focusing on details; for me it is important to experiment with new narrative forms. I had the means to do a film where I could follow my personal interests and intuitions. I wanted to be sincere even though I know that this kind of films can be problematic in terms of audience receptions.
You know the king was this Darth Vader figure here in Morocco, really. important historical event. I wanted the set to be realistic but the character to have these legendary and fantastic elements to them. In relation to what you are saying about being not too outspoken and didactic, we found really interesting that the main character did not talk at all throughout the film. Why is that? I spent three years writing the script and it was hard because I had many ideas; you can see that each image is full of details and very sought after. I felt the need to break down the film
How do you think Moroccan audiences will receive the film? And how would you personally like the film to be received? What I find very interesting is the way in which the film polarizes audiences. They either love it or hate it. I like that, they both are strong feelings, which prove that my film has not left audiences indifferent. The point though is not to shock or to provoke for the sake of it, for me it is about sincerity. There is a very impressive scene when the old man is taken to the
police station and as he is about to get beaten he uses the king’s portrait as a shield… Ah, ah, ah! For me it was very funny when I wrote that part but later I was told that things like that happened for real you know, people hiding behind the king’s picture because the cops cannot touch you. You know the king was this Darth Vader figure here in Morocco, really. Hassan II was very charismatic but at the same time we are dealing with a very controversial figure here, with almost Kafka-like implications. Reality tends to be weird itself, you know all those eccentric characters in my film? I saw them in the streets of Casablanca! Was it difficult to get the film funded? We are lucky enough in Morocco where there is a strong interest and related policies that support filmmaking. I was talking yesterday with a Lebanese director who told me that things are not that easy there. I am very grateful for the cultural policies
that we have in Morocco, which now produces some twenty films per year. They are not all good of course, but the important is to try, we don’t have a long film history here, we are coming up so to speak. Are the funding institutions concerned about what the film is going to be about? No. They are pretty cool about it. You know, cinema is about seduction: you have to seduce a producer with your story. If your script is valid and your background as filmmaker relevant then people will trust you and your film. In Morocco we don’t have censorship, there is no one coming after me telling me what I should and shouldn’t put in my film, we don’t have such things. If they give me the money it is because they trust the project, they think it has potential. Celluloid Liberation Front
meet mahfouz
Al Karnak
Aly Badrakhan (Egypt, 1975) Aly Badrakhan’s Al-Karnak may not be screened as part of Naguib Mahfouz’s tribute, yet our participant Mohamed Beshir wanted to report on a novel and a film that marked a generation of Egyptians… For our generation -Egyptians born in the 80s- the film Al-Karnak was an urban legend. You would hear stories about the political boldness, or the explicit scenes, but since its limited release in the cinemas in 1975, and for decades to come, the film was banned from being screened on television or displayed on video stores, until only a few years back when a censored version of the film started surfacing on satellite channels, coinciding with a new era of political strategy in Egypt that saw allowing of venting channels as a survival tactic. The unofficial ban was not the first link between the film and the political leadership. A basic comparison between the screenplay and Naguib Mahfouz’s novella it’s based on reveals some insightful findings; most significant would be the imposition of October 1973 war in the screenplay as the book end scene with the rest of the story told as a long flashback. Seemingly glorifying the then current Saddat regime was the golden way to allow for the political fierce critique of the previous Nasser era. Neutralizing the political leadership was not the only aim Mamdouh El Leithy (writer/ producer) targeted in his interpretive screenplay; attempting to ensure commercial success led to addition of comedy generating characters to the original story, as well as a trademark fight scene anticipated by fans of actor Farid Shawqy. Being his first feature film, director Aly Badrakhan swings between delivering the overloaded script and establishing his own style, the notion that led to an inflated two and a half hour film, paced mainly by the vibrant performances of Soad Hosny, Kamal El Shennawy and Nour El Sherif, in addition to surges of exceptional editing and camera work that brought together some iconic scenes like Zainab’s suicide attempt scene. The film portraits a revolution that went wrong, following Zainab, Esmail and Helmy, university colleagues who believe themselves to be “the sons of the revolution” and attempt to act as such. Their genuine activism triggers the frantic secret police unit, leading
to rounds of groundless detention where they are exposed to physically and psychologically torture that ultimately led to the death of Helmy. Rereading Mahfouz’s Al-Karnak in the nowadays Egyptian context reveals a timeless relevance to it; Mahfouz - in his classical exercise turns a current sociopolitical event into a pool for denser metaphors of generational interaction and human struggle that transcendent the locality of time and place. In comparison, the film version of Al-Karnak succeeds in being the first Egyptian political film to exposes the brutality of the Nasserite police state so bluntly, but in the process missed core values of the book. by Mohamed Beshir
Panel Naguib Mahfouz: Man of Cinema Tuesday 18/10 2:30pm to 4:00pm Fairmont, Saker Ballroom A لم تكن موجودة فى القصة،ذات طابع كوميدي و هو، فضال عن اضافة مشهد المعركة،األصلية وجود العالمة التجارية الجاذبة لجماهير الممثل .فريد شوقي تَ ��وزع مجهود مخرج الفيلم علي بدرخان – فى بين تحقيق المستويات- تجربته االخراجية االولى ،العديدة للسيناريو و تأسيس أسلوبه الخاص االمر الذى ادى الى تمدد مدة الفيلم لتصل الى مخاطرا بالحفاظ على ايقاع،ساعتين و نصف جاء اداء الممثلين، على جانب اخر.مترابط للفيلم خصوصا تألق االداء الجماعى بين سعاد,اكثر تميزا وكمال الشناوى و نور،حسني المفعمة بالحياة اضافة إلى اللحظات البارزة من التناغم.الشريف التى انتجت بعض المشاهد,بين الصورة و المونتاج .االستثنائية مثل مشهد محاولة زينب في االنتحار ،يصور «الكرنك» قصة ث��ورة اخ��ذت منحى خاطئا وه��م زمالء,متتبعا زينب و إسماعيل و حلمى الجامعة الذين يؤمنون بأنهم «أب��ن��اء ال��ث��ورة» و اال ان حماسهم,يتصرفون على ه��ذا االساس ،الحقيقى للثورة يثير انتباه البوليس السياسى مما يؤدى إلى جوالت من االعتقال المتكرر على حيث يتعرضون للتعذيب الجسدي,أسس واهية الذى يؤدى في نهاية مطافه إلى وفاة,والنفسي .حلمي ان إع���ادة ق���راءة «ك��رن��ك» محفوظ ف��ي السياق المصري الحالى يكشف ع��ن قيمتها الخالدة؛ فباسلوبه المعهود يمارس محفوظ مهمة تحويل الى رؤيه,حدث اجتماعي و سياسي فى زمن معين ,مكثفة عن التفاعل بين األجيال و النضال االنسانى .تلك الرؤية التى تتخطى حاجزي الزمان والمكان فقد نجحت النسخة السينمائية،و بالمقارنة ل��رواي��ة «الكرنك» في انجاز أول فيلم سياسي مصري يفضح وحشية الدولة البوليسية فى العهد فات الفيلم، في هذا الخضم كله، بيد انه،الناصري .قيما اساسية فى الرواية محمد بشير
الكرنك
علي بدرخان- مصر1975
ّ شكل فيلم «الكرنك» بعدأ اسطوريا بالنسبة لجيلنا من فكانت القصص تتوارد.المصريين الذين ولدوا في الثمانينات اال ان مشاهدة,عن جرأته السياسية و مشاهده الصريحة الفيلم نفسه كانت شبة مستحيلة على م��دى سنوات تم،1975 فمنذ عرضه المحدود في دور السينما عام،طويلة حظر عرض الفيلم على شاشة التلفزيون أو التداول فى قبل ان تُ طرح، واستمر االمر سنوات كثيرة.نوادي الفيديو الى االس��واق نسخة خضعت الى الرقابة ليتم عرضها على تزامنا مع مرحلة جديدة من االستراتيجية، القنوات الفضائية التي ارتأت السماح لبعض قنوات التعبير,السياسية في مصر .للتنفيس عن الكبت المتراكم كتكتيك للبقاء لم يكن هذا الحظر غير الرسمي الحلقة األولى فى العالقة فمقارنة سريعة بين, بين الفيلم وال��ق��ي��ادة السياسية ،سيناريو الفيلم و رواي��ة نجيب محفوظ المقتبس عنها أهمها فرض،تكشف بعض المالحظات ذات الدالالت البليغة في السيناريو كالمشهد االساسى فى1973 حرب اكتوبر لتصبح بقية القصة عبارة عن فالش باك,بداية الفيلم ونهايته فالواضح ان تمجيد نظام السادات الحاكم آنذاك كان.طويل الطريق الذهبي للسماح بتوجيه نقد سياسي عنيف لعهد .الرئيس عبد الناصر تحييد القيادة السياسية لم يكن الهدف الوحيد لممدوح الليثي (كاتب السيناريو و المنتج) فى اعادة رؤيته للرواية؛ تم إضافة شخصيات،ففى محاولة لضمان النجاح التجاري
Director of The Tiniest Place, Mexico
photo by Filippo Zambon
Tatiana Huezo
portrait / بورترية
It was two years ago that the documentary maker Tatiana Huezo received a phone call from the Mexican national film school advising her to apply for funding. For four years she had been looking everywhere to fund her ‘opera prima’ The Tiniest Place without any result. Tatiana Huezo had already decided to throw the towel, and was starting to look for a new documentary project while being unemployed for a year and a half in Madrid. Born in El Salvador, Huezo moved at the age of four to Mexico City, where she grew up till her cinema studies. Later on she went to learn documentary filmmaking in Barcelona. During her youth she would often visit her grandmother, Eva, back in El Salvador. During one of those trips, Eva insisted on her visiting the family’s small hometown Cinquera, deep in the jungle, where electricity has barely arrived to this day. "Upon arriving, I went for a walk to the main square. A woman walked up to me and told: ‘Rina, you’re back! You haven’t changed a bit! How is it that you came back?’ I then walked to the church, and instead of having the typical religious images of saints and virgins,
there were at least one hundred images of teenagers and young adults, and a helicopter tail.” The photos were of the town youth that went to fight in the 80’s civil war. Cinquera had been deeply indoctrinated with communist ideology, and its inhabitants were recruited as guerrilla fighters for the war against the US-backed government. When the regime put its finger on the town, inhabitants started to get systematically bombed and killed by fighter jets and helicopters. Women joined the guerrilla to avoid rape. Eventually the people of Cinquera went to take refuge inside a cave nearby for almost two years. Upon returning they found a town they could not recognize. “I knew about the war, but I never knew to what extent these terrible things had happened”, says Tatiana Huezo. In a trip to a mount nearby, the filmmaker found the ground full of empty bullet shells and shrapnel; the war was still very much an open wound. She learnt about terrible facts; for example, the reason why there was not a single pig in Cinquera. As pigs tend to dig deeply, they frequently unearthed body remains, and thus they were banned. “It was like feeling death upon me. I was identified with those people in the pictures, they looked just like me. It felt like a mirror. It became clear that I had to tell this story.” Thanks to the unexpected grant from the Mexican national film school, Tatiana could spend a month and a half in town with the photographer –and her husband- Ernesto Parto hearing people stories, and having the opportunity to ‘feel’ the town. “I have deep respect for these people, but also to the forces that can be felt in Cinquera. I worked very closely with Ernesto, watching movies, talking a lot, and constant-
ly searching for a certain look that could reflect the overwhelming jungle, hot and humid, and inhabited with ghosts. I felt this story had to be told like a ‘monsters and fairies tale’.” After four years of preparation, months of research, nine weeks of shooting, two months of editing, The Tiniest Place was eventually screened in February 2011 at the Ambulante Festival in Mexico. Later on, it was awarded Best Film at the prestigious Visions du Réel festival in Switzerland. Five months ago Tatiana returned to Cinquera to show the film. “On the communal house we improvised a cinema, a white cloth for screen, speakers, and a projector.” The room was filled two hours before the screening. “I was quite worried for the protagonists, because in this film their feelings are on the open.” As Tatiana points out, most of the characters have attempted to commit suicide at one point, mainly because of chronic insomnia. A heartbreaking moment in the film is when a mother recounts the last meeting with her a fifteen year old daughter, as she decides to go to war. “Please mother, do not cry when I die. We belong to death.” After laughs and tears, the spokesman of the town asked Tatiana a favor: for every house in Cinquera to have a copy of the film, for everyone to remember what happened. Miguel Fernández Flores
Screening times Tuesday 18/10 VOX 1 12:45 PM