NO             B-            

Chile  France  USA  (116 mi)  2011  d:  Pablo Larraín

This is another heavily awarded film that seems a curious choice at best, the only Chilean film to have been nominated for an Academy Award in the Foreign Film category, also winning the Art Cinema top prize in the Director’s Fortnight at Cannes where it received a “rousing standing ovation” when it screened.  While few South American films receive this kind of recognition, the award may be more for the director’s dogged persistence in completing his Trilogy using a background of Chilean General Augusto Pinochet’s 15-year military dictatorship, also including TONY MANERO (2008), an extremely provocative take on the Fascist mindset of the era, turning a disco dancer into a psychopathic serial killer with an ever accumulating body count, where the military presence looms ominously in the background, and POST MORTEM (2010), where a similar sociopathic character (played by the same actor Alfredo Castro) is a mortuary assistant who remains obsessed with a nightclub dancer even as the bodies pile up, remaining blind to the accumulating horrors of Pinochet's military regime.  Both films were shot in a grainy 16 mm blown up to 35 mm, where the director obviously feels comfortable with this grungy aesthetic, choosing a primitive U.S.-bought, 1983 U-matic video camera in the final installment that helps the film achieve the gritty authenticity of archival news footage from the era.  While some may accept the pale, washed out colors and the persistent blurriness throughout, resembling standard television shows from the 50’s or 60’s as opposed to the late 80’s, this easily qualifies as one of the ugliest looking films seen in decades.  While it was obviously the director’s choice, one would think it would only look worse on a small television screen, as it only seems to alienate or further isolate the viewer from the subject matter, especially since so little archival footage is actually used other than television broadcasts.  But what footage there is does blend seamlessly into the rest of the movie, but it begs the question, is that really necessary?  Do we not already understand the ugliness of the situation?  What’s different about NO from the other two films is rather than delve into the Fascist mindset, this one shows a Chilean population finally doing something about it, expressed in often darkly satiric images that show a fundamental understanding of how creatively developed media advertising, through originality alone, can overcome the apparent political stranglehold in government controlled mass media.       

While the film provides no background information whatsoever, Pinochet was installed in a U.S. backed military coup d’état in 1973 when democratically elected Socialist President Salvador Allende allegedly took his own life while under siege, surrounded by an armed opposition.  Pinochet’s Fascist military dictatorship ended democratic rule and targeted all political opponents, where thousands of leftists were killed, 30,000 tortured, and 80,000 arrested indefinitely, often disappearing without a trace, most all of which happened immediately after assuming power in 1973.  Nearly a quarter of a million left the country in exile, claiming political persecution from a Fascist police state that allowed no political dissent, and more followed when the nation’s economy continued to fail throughout the decade, where Pinochet was believed to have embezzled as much as $28 million dollars.  Nonetheless, at the behest of the U.S. that installed him, Pinochet agreed to abide by the outcome of a Constitutional referendum, the 1988 plebiscite, which would democratically legitimize his power.  In the month before the vote, the government controlled television airwaves allowed each side 15 minutes daily to make their case for or against Pinochet, scheduled late at night to suppress the viewership.  The film is a fictionalized adaptation by Pedro Peirano from an Antonio Skármeta play Referendum (both of whom appear as Pinochet supporters), where Gael García Bernal plays René Saavedra, a young hotshot advertising executive whose father was an infamous political exile.  His ultra conservative boss is Alfredo Castro, the star of the earlier Trilogy films, playing Lucho Guzmán, who’s none too pleased when he gets word that René has been approached by Urrutia (Luis Gnecco), a vanguard Socialist representing a heavily factionalized group of 16 opposition parties to design an advertising campaign against Pinochet, where they play upon the actual word “no,” suggesting no more, no violence, no repression, no dictatorship, no disappearances, etc.  But as many voices as there are in this coalition, there are as many disagreements, especially when René decides to take a positive and upbeat approach, distinguishing themselves from the repressed Pinochet conformity, marketing new and original ideas as the nation’s hope for the future.  What the leftists see, however, is a strategy to sell democracy much as they would any other capitalist product, making pleasing Pepsi generation commercials endorsing the No vote, where “Happiness is coming if you vote No,” instead of the more informative leftist political rhetoric, often leading to dismissive outrage, Escena de: "No" - Película de Pablo Larraín YouTube (5:11).

    

What the film does especially well is establish a shadowy, noirish atmosphere of lurking menace, where René’s car and property are vandalized while police vehicles remain parked outside, or he receives threatening phone calls that harm may come to his young son, and his boss makes still more threats about what could happen to him, so it’s a bit ironic that while others insist upon gloomy reminders of the horrors of living under a military dictatorship in their approach, René sticks to the positive, targeting youth culture with rainbow images of happiness and joy, young people dancing in the streets and singing a familiar “We Are the World” style theme song Michael Jackson - WE ARE THE WORLD - HD STEREO ... - YouTube (7:05) turning into something like this, Exclusive clip from Pablo Larraín's new film No, starring Gael García Bernal YouTube (1:53).  Within this murky existence, the film fails to address the sins of the Pinochet regime other than by insinuation, where facts and archival footage are surprisingly absent.  When Guzmán is assigned by the Fascists to head the Yes campaign, where in the Pinochet military vernacular they’re running against “faggots and commies,” pitting a subordinate against his boss, he threatens to use strong-armed tactics that are never employed.  For instance, what’s stopping a boss from demanding excessive work hours from René so he has no time left to spend on the campaign, or, as Guzmán has armed militants at his disposal, a police state from destroying the No television studio and all their equipment, making it impossible to produce nightly segments?  Hell, this kind of stuff was shown in Sam Fuller’s PARK ROW (1952) during rival newspaper wars, one side’s dirty tactics pitted against the other, until one is bombed out of business.  Instead, the audience continually sees short 30 to 60 second TV spots, without a clue how they’re filling 15 minutes every night, or how well their spots are doing with the public.  It’s likely there were other forces at work besides the TV campaign, but they’re not a part of this film, suggesting it was the work of this group alone that finally toppled a dictatorship, winning 56% of the vote, where 97% of the electorate voted, eventually leading to democratic elections for the Presidency and Parliament.  Television is a powerful medium, combined with the savvy political effectiveness of well calculated advertising, like candidate Obama’s very effective 2008 slogans promising “Change we can believe in,” or “Yes we can,” where this victory in Chile after 15 years of living under the thumb of a police state must have felt like the elation of electing the first black President in the United States.  There’s very little build up, however, or a rush of excitement, as the workers were led to believe they had little chance, where Gael García Bernal’s acting performance is emotionally subdued throughout, rarely showing any emotion except his outbursts against downbeat leftist rhetoric.  Even when victory is declared, he can’t even crack a smile, still living under the constant fear of reprisals.

The Grin Without a Cat (Le Fond de L’Air Est Rouge)

A GRIN WITHOUT A CAT (Le Fond de L’Air Est Rouge)        A 

France  (240 mi)  1977     re-edited 1993 US version (180 mi)  d:  Chris Marker 

The workers will take the struggle from the fragile hands of the students.

One is unlikely to ever see so much collected Communist footage without watching propaganda films, as Marker, a member of the “Left Bank” of the New Wave for his Marxist inspired politics, fought in the French Resistance during World War II, and his films, like ¡CUBA SI! (1961), are often sympathetic to Socialist movements around the world.  His work combines social issues with formal experiment, getting his start as a foreign correspondent and inquiring reporter, where he is especially interested in transitional societies, “Life in the process of becoming history.”  His films are not only set in specific places, they are about the cultures of those places, calling his approach “Involved objectivity.”  An epic, years-in-the-making history of militant/revolutionary struggle from the 1960’s, there are essentially two versions of this film, a 1977 four-hour version in French, which would probably score a higher grade, and a 1993 re-edited, three-hour English language translation, which likely loses something without the original French speakers, such as Yves Montand and Simone Signoret, who are among the collective of French narrative voices.  Ideally, in film essays, one appreciates the tone of the narrative voice, such as the authoritarian, yet highly personal voice of Terrence Davies in Of Time and the City (2008), whose eloquence and perfect diction reflects his devout Catholic upbringing, which he angrily rails against in his heavily autobiographical film.  Without hearing the intended voices when Marker made the film, one can only surmise what must be missing from this American version, as the dry and emotionless English language narrator continually takes the air out of the wealth of material with his monotone and often lifeless readings.  That’s unfortunate, as certainly one of the revelations of this film is the rare historic nature of the collected archival materials, where the narrator should help put this invaluable footage in perspective.  Consider this segment with a French narration, presumably Marker himself, beautifully recalling a childhood experience when he first watched Eisenstein’s BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN (1925) Grin Without a Cat (Opening Sequence) - Chris Marker - YouTube (4:04), emphatically describing that magical moment when he first hears the words “Brothers!”  This opening POTEMKIN sequence is utterly enthralling, especially with that mix of militarism and Mozart in the original score written by Luciano Berio, using carefully edited clips from the original movie, then cleverly introducing chosen footage of 1960’s demonstrations that resulted in bloody clashes with heavily armed police, mirroring the chaos and pandemonium from the Odessa Steps sequence. 

Along with Jean Eustache’s film The Mother and the Whore (La Maman et la Putain) (1973), these are definitive expressions of innocence lost, reflecting the aftermath of the failed French revolution in May 1968 and the end of the French New Wave, while Bertolucci’s film Before the Revolution (Prima della rivoluzione) (1964) is a wonderfully insightful critique of the Communist Party leading up to that promised day when the revolution would finally come.  Marker’s video essay is comprised entirely of archival footage on revolutionary events between 1966 and 1977, dividing his work into two parts, first examining the unity and optimism gearing up for May 1968 in France, while also documenting the subsequent collapse of global socialist struggles, leaving the Left fractured and in disarray afterwards.  If there is one word that encapsulates what the 60’s was about, that word would be Vietnam.  Marker shows footage of American armed merchants selling their wares, including explosive devices that can be hooked up to common household items such as soap dishes, proudly displaying their effectiveness, claiming this could easily blow up a car as well.  America’s fascination with weapons is displayed by an overzealous Air Force pilot filmed while on a mission dropping bombs and napalm on Vietnam, positively exhilarated that he was able to obliterate live targets seen running on the ground out in the open Air Force pilot in Vietnam: at war and loving it - YouTube (2:00).  Perhaps the poster faces of revolution in the 60’s were that of a youthful Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, both advocates of guerilla warfare.  While this tactic may have worked in Cuba, leading Parisian socialists were not so quick to pronounce this an effective strategy in Europe.  Nonetheless, there is plenty of footage of Castro analyzing the various international strategies, such as the Cuban Missile crisis or the Russian decision to abandon Cuba, where more than any other, he is the most featured speaker.  The film examines the effectiveness of Stalinism, suggesting one of the problems of the Russian Revolution was the lack of input from ordinary citizens, where it was not a people’s revolution, ruling instead through despotic control, using the police and armed military to prevent dissent, so the socialist mindset was never accepted by ordinary citizens, believing it was imposed upon them rather than a collective method where everyone contributed to the whole, which is exactly how Russia always portrayed itself in the propaganda films.  By contrast, the Chinese Revolution is a people’s revolution, where ordinary people are the engine that generates activism, where they have a personal stake in the output, generated by local party council meetings where they are constantly feeding input to the top.  The problem, however, is corruption, where a few would rather consolidate their own power, taking advantage of their position in the party for special favors.  Nonetheless, effective or not, there was a growing influence of Maoism, especially after the Sino-Soviet Split, where even the American Black Panther Party carried around Mao’s Little Red Book, aka Quotations from Chairman Mao.   

Without ever endorsing any particular method, Marker is careful not to editorialize, but offers perhaps the best composite overview and critique of his own failed Marxist dream, occasionally interjecting an eccentric electronic score that adds a fragmented touch of dissonance or discord, where the events leading up to May 1968 are prefaced by other Protests of 1968, including a worldwide series of demonstrations and strikes, largely comprised of students and workers, including the Tlatelolco massacre of 200 protesters in Mexico ten days prior to the 1968 Summer Olympic games, where not a single country lodged any protest.  May 1968 is significant because the world might be a different place had there been a different outcome, truly a historic moment in time when the Parisian student demonstrations combined with nationwide French worker strikes creating the largest general strike in the history of an advanced industrial nation, a prolonged two-week strike involving 11 million workers and nearly a quarter of the French population.  The impact was so significant it brought about the collapse of the De Gaulle government, but there is still plenty of disagreement about what went wrong, where the general consensus is the lack of a cohesive direction, where the Communist Party all but supported the government, as the leftist student movements never made the case for a worker’s movement, the foundation of any socialist revolution, allowing a wedge to be brought between the two groups which the government capitalized upon.  Major Ralph “Pappy” Shelton is seen in his Pentagon offices describing the capture and killing of Che Guevara in the mountains of Bolivia, proudly gloating at this success, eager to assess blame that Che’s mistake was relying upon a Communist Party that hadn’t established a footing and never connected with the locals in Bolivia, leaving him isolated and vulnerable.  This event seems to foreshadow more ominous occurrences yet to come. 

Marker’s analysis of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in August of 1968 is nothing short of breathtaking, perhaps the high point of the film, as it capsulizes the deflated hopes of those advocating international socialism, that call to arms for fraternal brotherhood so brilliantly depicted in POTEMKIN.  Even Castro is outraged, calling it an illegal act when a socialist nation militarily occupies another nation, as it goes against everything the international brotherhood of socialists stand for and only weakens their position worldwide.  Marker also provides stunning footage of recently elected Socialist President Salvador Allende in Chile addressing a gathering crowd, charming and completely relaxed, displaying a candid logic and intelligence while attempting to alleviate tensions about converting the nation to a socialist state, claiming there are already capitalist precedents.  He is also seen giving a surprisingly honest speech about the necessity of imposing a wage freeze to avert inflation, for which he received jeers and hisses at a worker’s hall gathering where he speaks about a worker’s moral obligation, but he was the tragic victim of a U.S. backed military coup shortly afterwards, allegedly committing a forced suicide while surrounded by an armed opposition, immediately installing military head Augusto Pinochet.  We see Allende’s daughter Beatriz gravely addressing a crowd in Cuba afterwards, receiving a warm reception, but she later committed suicide.  A collection of TV reports, guerrilla newsreels, government propaganda, speeches, and various interviews, the images are drawn mainly from rarely shown footage shot by others, chiefly outtakes from other documentaries, Marker has a way of distilling seemingly disparate ideas in surprisingly provocative ways.  A memorial to those free spirits who fought for liberty, equality, and human solidarity, Liberté, égalité, fraternité, the national motto of France, Marker’s film is bluntly critical, while remaining poetic and perceptive in its analysis, a landmark work where there is nothing else remotely like it.  Unfortunately, a moving and significant credit at the end remains untranslated in the American version, paying tribute to the collective nature of filmmaking, “The true authors of this film are the countless cameramen, technical operators, witnesses and activists whose work is constantly pitted against that of the powers that be, who would like us to have no memory.”

Excerpts from a 15-page Marker essay entitled Sixties originally released by Icarus Film Distribution Company upon the film’s 2008 DVD release, seen here:

Sixties - MARKER - 2008 - Critical Quarterly - Wiley Online Library 

In May anyway the final whistle came quickly: with the first casualty. Not too serious for revolutionaries, but it’s a fact, the murder of Pierre Overney by a Renault watchman would bring everyone back to the real value of lives, things and words. On the workers’ front, the great wave finally met its dikes, a phenomenon summarised by former minister Edgar Pisani in one sentence, ‘a terrible connivance between the conservative apparatus of the CGT (the communist-led union) and the conservative apparatus of the government’. And a great disorder fell on everyone’s mind.

Strangely, the small clannish fights used to draw a kind of overdetermination from the fact they had developed in this fuzzy space of the imaginary revolution. Left to their own devices amidst a reassured country, they became weakly and purposeless. Historical Anarchy had died – heroically – in Spain. To refer to it now made no more sense than being a royalist, unless it became an ideological business, quite profitable at that. The Communist Party had missed every helping hand offered by History and started the long spin of a motorless airplane. French Maoism would remain a landmark in the history of teratology. The foolishness of morons is a plague, but statistically speaking we have to put up with it. What is fascinating is the foolishness of clever people and in this particular case, some of the cleverest.

Elsewhere, things were more violent, more difficult than in France, but the curve was the same. For having gleaned a few traces of these luminous and murky years, I tinkered with these films. They don’t claim to be any more than that: traces. Even the most megalomaniac, A Grin Without a Cat (originally four hours long, wisely reduced to three but without modifying the content, just shortening it, with a short monologue at the end), is in no way the chronicle of a decade. Its inevitable gaps would become unjustifiable. It revolves around a precise theme: what happens when a party, the CP, and a great power, the USSR, cease to embody the revolutionary hope, what looms up in their place and how the showdown is staged. The irony is that thirty years later, the question is irrelevant. Both have ceased to exist and the only chronicle is that of the unending rehearsal of a play which has never premiered.