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- Convenors:
-
Clara Garavelli
(University of Leicester)
Beatriz Tadeo Fuica (University of St Andrews)
- Location:
- Malet 354
- Start time:
- 3 April, 2014 at
Time zone: Europe/London
- Session slots:
- 2
Short Abstract:
Since the turn of the century, many Latin American countries have implemented socio-political and cultural changes in tune with an intellectual left and a 'Latin-Americanist' project. This panel seeks to explore the impacts of these changes on the big screen, focusing on films and media policies.
Long Abstract:
The socio-political changes promoted by the new left-wing governments that have risen throughout Latin America since the beginning of the 21st Century were accompanied by modifications in media regulations and an array of audio-visual productions related to this phenomenon. Accordingly, this panel seeks to explore different cinematic responses to these macro-changes, which include, among others, a renewed relationship with the recent past and politics of memory, regional collaborations and cultural interactions, new film and media policies and agreements. On the one hand, the panel aims to analyse the representation of these changes in specific film(s) and filmmaker(s). On the other hand, it intends to examine matters related to the production, exhibition and distribution of these works, ie: the stimulation of local/regional filmmaking practices and/or industries. Examples will be given from well-established and emergent cinemas including comparative analyses. This panel will offer an opportunity to put diverse policies and films into dialogue in order to evaluate the impact of these new governments on the continental cultural life during the first decade, or so, of the new millennium.
Accepted papers:
Session 1Paper short abstract:
The “newest” Chilean cinema, to a great extent promoted by Chilean centre-left cultural polices, has had a significant international success in recent years. The paper addresses aspects of the political economy of this kind of production, and the local critical reception of its predominant images.
Paper long abstract:
The last 20 years, in Chile there has been a strong boost of national film production. The centre-left government developed a new set of cultural policies, which were intended to recover the state's involvement in the industry, abruptly interrupted during the former right-wing dictatorship. This has implied a significant transformation in the context of production, including the legal framework of audio-visual production, the funding system and the possibilities of exhibition; as well as the spectrum of Chilean film production. As a result, Chilean cinema has been largely subsided by the state, driven by the attempt -arguably contradictory- to potentiate cinema as an economically successful national industry framed in the neoliberal model. Film production has been often supported under the assumption that film would potentiate certain "national image": local and "popular" during the 1990s, and more "cosmopolitan" since the mid-2000s, linked to a growing internationalization of Chilean film. The paper addresses the relative consolidation of this "Newest" Chilean Cinema in this context, which has showed a consistent success in the international festival circuit in recent years. Particularly, the paper aims to analyse the latest Chilean cinema "for export", suggesting the emergence of certain type of predominant Chilean-international aesthetic. It focuses in the type of national and political imaginaries traceable in most of this production, as well as in the local reception and political critique of the films in Chile, where they have been understood as a valuable yet troublesome kind of national cinema.
Paper short abstract:
Since the new cinema law in 2003, there are signs of positive changes in Colombian cinema: new aesthetics, dialogs with the past and hopes for the future of Colombian cinematography and the country itself, introducing their films at the international festivals.
Paper long abstract:
For many years, Colombian cinema was virtually absent from the international arena. Few titles which reached international public, shocked with excessive violence, poverty and lack of hope. And they were followed by silence of struggle to produce new ambitious films, in the country where the state infrastructure supporting film industry was absent for most of its history.
Since the new cinema law in 2003, things start to take the positive change. With the professionalization of the industry and the institutional support, the number of valuable titles and international collaborations has sharply risen. There is a visible interest of local filmmakers in exploring the richness and abundance of the Colombian culture, without the fear of facing the ghosts of the past, and without abusing the negative stereotypes. With these changes and new energy in the industry, the Colombian cinema has a potential to become one of the most intriguing cinematographies of the region. Films became more self-aware in their subjects, and the audiences of growing number of international festivals are finally given a chance to discover this diverse and fascinating country though its films. Paradoxically, the fact that Colombia remains slightly undiscovered on the international arena, makes it more interesting for the filmmakers and the audiences. Local audiences - to attempt to reflect on the situation of the country and its potentials, and foreign audiences - to learn more about this incredibly beautiful and seductive country.
Paper short abstract:
Since the left-wing coalition Frente Amplio (Broad Front, FA) took office, several funds have been created to promote the development of national audiovisual production. This paper examines the impact of these policies on the current sustained growth of Uruguayan cinema.
Paper long abstract:
Uruguay provides a case in which most of its cinema used to be low-budget, piecemeal, independent, often political, and made by amateur filmmakers. The state had never supported the sustained production of cinema or any other form of audiovisual media. It was not until 1995 that the first public fund appeared: the FONA (Fondo para el Fomento y Desarollo de la Produccion Audiovisual Nacional) was created by the Municipality of Montevideo, which, since 1990 had been in the hands of the left-wing coalition Frente Amplio (Broad Front, FA). While the creation of this fund was an important first step, the most noticeable changes have been taking place since 2004, when the FA won the national elections. Since then, several funds have been created and, in 2008, the first Film Law was passed. This law has ensured the availability of funds and has provided a legal framework to support filmmakers both at national and international levels.
The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, it examines the most salient changes promoted by the left-wing coalition; and secondly, it explores the film Reus (2011), which was supported by all the funding bodies available to Uruguayan filmmakers and co-produced with Brazil. The analysis of both the search for funding made by these young filmmakers and specific aesthetic choices of the film, aims to illustrate the current landscape of Uruguayan film production at a time in which the left coalition, still in power, promotes the slogan 'un cine, un país'.
Paper short abstract:
This paper discusses the documentary films that Fernando Solanas has made since the Argentine crisis of 2001, analysing them in relation to Solanas’ ground-breaking "La hora de los hornos" (1969) and his position as a politician in contemporary Argentina.
Paper long abstract:
The Argentine documentary "La hora de los hornos" (1969, dir. Fernando Solanas and Octavio Getino) is one of the most emblematic examples of radical cinema. The film constituted the foundation of the Third Cinema movement and was conceived as an instrument to help in the struggle for social emancipation. Eventually, Solanas and Getino collaborations were interrupted by forced exile. Only Solanas would go back to directing documentary films in Argentina, but not before the economic collapse of 2001. Although much has been written about "La hora" and the Third Cinema movement, less attention has been paid to Solanas' recent series of documentary works, which include "Memoria del saqueo" (2003); "La dignidad de los nadies" (2005), "Argentina latente" (2007), and "La próxima estación." The objective of this paper is to explore this corpus of films. I will argue that, having abandoned the rhetoric of decolonisation and revolutionary struggle that informed "La hora", these works still retain a utopian core as its basis - even in the case of a film like La próxima estación, which is closer to a dystopian rather than a utopian text. I will then discuss the tensions present in Solanas' films, considering his position as a political figure (founder of the Proyecto Sur party and a key member of the left-wing coalition Unen) and the collisions between the Peronist-inflected rhetoric that characterised his early works and that of his recent documentaries.
Paper short abstract:
This paper aims to explore the politics of representation of the documentary films on Nestor Kirchner, in order to comprehend to what extent the figure of the Argentine ex-president has become an embodiment of power and a controversial symbol of popular resistance in contemporary Argentina.
Paper long abstract:
2013 marked the 10th anniversary of the Kirchner government. Amidst current debates on the future of the country, the lack of a strong political alternative gives its fervent followers the illusion of an everlasting party. The images of the leaders have been used, either by critics or supporters, as necessary stepping-stones towards condemnation or sanctification of their figures, and they have contributed to stir up those debates. Bearing this in mind, the following paper aims to explore the politics of representation of the documentary films entitled South of the Border (Stone 2010), Néstor Kircher, la película (De Luque 2012), and Néstor Kirchner (Caetano 2013), in order to comprehend the extent to which the figure of the Argentine ex-president Néstor Kirchner has become an embodiment of power and a controversial symbol of popular resistance in contemporary Argentina. Accordingly, this paper will delve into the secular perspective provided by Stone -an outsider working from Hollywood-, into the biased construction of a supreme being, as well as into the controversial depiction of Adrián Caetano's commissioned documentary.