rudronriver

Francisco de Quevedo left a journey to the other shore of the Styx in the literary canon. He set sail from Ecclesiastes (dust to dust) and dusted "the terminal shadow" .

The sonnet Love that endures beyond death is positioned by Quevedo at the arrival of that journey, that happens "in the white day". But an obligatory, not voluntary, journey without return is actually an exile. Exile in which, Quevedo says, he would not abandon the memory of all the love that was already burning on the other part of the bank, and that although it will be turned into ashes, its materiality is irrelevant.

The film They will be dust places a journey of this type (to death) in the moment before departure, and metaphysics is dispensed with. The best thing it gives us is being able to interpret it from two points of view, since there are two travelers. To do justice the protagonist should be the healthy one, who undertakes the journey voluntarily, but we can at any time put the spotlight on his partner, who will do it completely against his will, like Quevedo did

But the film has little relation with the aforementioned sonnet. And by placing the film, unlike the poem, before setting sail for the other shore, the result is totally anti-poetic. Thus, the most sinister situations have to occur: from the domestic conflicts in the heterogeneous family that this couple has formed, to the sordidness of the aseptic euthanasia-friendly Switzerland. Given the threat of a melodramatic turn, how will the film avoid shipwreck? Well, let's go to the mix of genres and introduce musical numbers, and have everyone dance with their necks dislocated by computer-assisted images. It is actually nothing new (in our time we go very fast and this mix already sounds quite familiar to us)

The script is truly intelligent, but it seems very pawed, and has put together a story with more traps than a cannibal film. As a demonstration of the unscrupulous foundation of the story, I propose to imagine two assumptions that, if incorporated into it, would collapse this film. One would be to imagine a reversal of roles between the sexes (that the terminally ill spouse was the man and the suicidal one was the woman): I doubt it would be accepted unanimously in today's society.

The other scenario that I propose would be to introduce, in a symmetrical way to those with the woman (magnificent Ángela Molina), other comic musical numbers that mock the suicidal decision. Sure, it will be said, the thing can adopt techniques of "distancing" and musical comedy for her, but not for him. The mockery of death, the black humor, is nothing new, but if those last numbers of tanato-slapstick had the suicidal as its protagonist, the film would be very different. We understand that to enforce this symmetry they would have had to paw the script a little more, and now we would be talking about another movie. But in this one we will not see that the husband takes part in the musical numbers, it seems that the unspeakable aspiration of the matter is that at the end some little tear will flow, whatever it may be. And then a soap opera song above the crematorium oven. Poor Quevedo

But it will not be denied that the journey we have contemplated leaves many interesting side effects along the way, which are the best part of the film. It is an achievement to constantly change our points of view: between hers, the terminally ill wife (a magnificent portrait of the paradigm of inequality in the intensity of love in the couple; it is even legitimate to doubt that she is in love at all, except of herself) and that of the suicidal husband who, if he even minimally joined the current of comedy, he would look like a slapping fool. It also gets the plot of children in the story right (even grandchildren are briefly introduced: what a pity that the discovery of death for children is not more developed). The visual design is consistent and is a good idea that it evolves towards white colour, surely inspired by the sonnet (Quevedo's sonnet only serves to give the title to the film and this type of ideas, do not think of anything else) but much less achieved there is the foreseeable appearance of ashes.

The comedic tone allows us to inscribe this film in a great archetype, one formulated by Fellini: the duo formed by the serious white clown and the clown Auguste. I already said that, on the verge of looking like the white-faced clown of the slaps, the serious husband (with the gravity of an Argentinian stuffed with self-help literature), is constantly mocked by the other clown, the Auguste brilliantly played by Ángela Molina (an evil Gelsomina). These are the risks of mixing genres, which a priori is praiseworthy. But the biggest risk of a film is in changing the tone. The story has been well told and its course constantly appeals to the viewer's position in the face of death, but in the ending there is an emergence of elements of intrigue, and doubt appears. And it's not only the co-star who doubts, the film also makes us doubt what will be the tone that prevails. That of the little tear? That of Busby Berkeley choreography? That of Stan and Laurel? The end of the film chooses to annul all seriousness, and leave us blank in "the white day" of Quevedo. Let's not say death is not the end, let's say death is not serious. Maybe it's a better consolation. But her death or his? Which clown wins?

The shortage of films dealing with the oppression imposed to a part of Spanish society (the people living in the Basque Country) by the Marxist-nationalist terrorism of the Basque separatist mafia-like organization ETA can only be explained by fear. The fear that makes very difficult to depict what happens in a society in which silence is the fist commandment also explains why, after 30 years of democracy and a generous autonomy for the Basque Region, the terrorists remain active. The making of this film had to overcome the negative of many of its possible crew to collaborate in it (ETA has killed journalists and intellectuals who oppose to the Basque Nazism). Terrorism in the Basque Country is directly supported by less than 10% of population but many Basques regard themselves as "moderate" nationalists (about 50% of the population votes for more or less "moderate" nationalist parties) but most of them oppose terrorism only in their speech but never in their action. It is a mean mix of fear and usefulness (when you are a nationalist your life becomes much more comfortable than the one of non-nationalist citizens) that remains unchallenged.

It would have been necessary many more movies that portray the life of those that have been threatened for opposing to the nationalist mafia, to advance in the fight against terror, and those films should have been made twenty years before. Gutierrez Aragon deserves credit for reflecting how fear is the fabric of that society: it is well depicted the way of living of a university teacher who must be escorted by bodyguards 24h a day, and it explains that thousands of other common citizens live under protection (plain councilors, journalists, teachers…) while their neighbors and "friends" give them their back. But the story most of the time does not flow but advances in fits and starts, and the political responsibility of the authorities is not discussed; it seems that when writing the script so many subjects were necessary to treat, because of the delay of years, that the mission was not successfully accomplished. So far, fiction has not been the accurate way for cinema to deal with that everyday reality and maybe only documentary movies could be successful in it. In the scarce list of movies dealing with the suffering of victims of the Basque nationalist terrorism one stands out: "Thirteen among a thousand "(2005) (Trece entre mil) by Basque director Arteta: it is a documentary and it is both more valiant and more precise than "Todos estamos invitados" in the objective to portrait the covered truth of a society oppressed by Nazis in the middle of a democratic and prosperous Europe.

This movie has become an absolute must, as there have been very few movies in Spanish cinema dealing with the mafia-like terrorist band ETA, and no one was filmed dealing with the suffering of terrorism victims ever. The lack of interest in ETA is explained by fear, as ETA has killed journalists and elected politicians as part of its mafia-like strategy of terror (many of the crew refused to put their complete name in credits: they appear just as initials).

But this is not a political film, it provokes reflection in the spectator, but that reflection has a moral dimension. The principal element in this documentary movie are the interviews with relatives of thirteen victims of ETA (from the one thousand that ETA has killed), they are the only protagonists and they are the only actors. The crimes they suffered are reconstructed with their accounts and archive images. It is not just an exercise of realism with past stories but in the interviews "is" the reality itself : the effects of the crimes are present in those people years after they were committed as have been present everyday since then.

This plain approach of showing only the point of view of victims of terrorism without cinematographic artifacts, without a narrator and practically without music succeeds in showing all the desolation that has changed the course of so many lives in Spain.

Although the responsible for the tragedies, the terrorists and their supporters, don't appear ever, they are present in the atmosphere of fear in the population of that Spanish region, the Basque Country. The society is frightened by murders and mobster extortion. This increases the sorrow of victims, as they feel the criminals can persist in their terror strategy. An example is the story of Pilar Elías, the widow of an elected politician murdered by a terrorist from their same little town (he had saved the life of his future killer when the later was a child), now Pilar is a councilwoman in that town and the terrorists have also attempted to kill her with a bomb. Her life is a hell among bodyguards and she has always to think where will the terrorists attempt to kill her again, "but they will not expel me from my town", she says.

Another difficulty that the victims continue suffering after the crimes were committed is expressed in the movie: the society and institutions have neglected to provide enough counseling and support to them because of a mixture of fear and lack of commitment against the Mafioso nationalists, that have an unspoken power in that society. But at he end of the movie there is an indication for hope that things could be changing: nowadays victims of terrorism obtain much more solidarity expressions from Spanish society than ever.

Steven Spielberg was involved in dealing with the suffering of victims of another genocide through the creation of "Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation" that produced a series of documentaries about the suffering of surviving victims after the holocaust. We can compare "Thirteen among a thousand" with these documentary movies based in interviews with victims (Spielberg's approach to terrorism, "Munich", is not a documentary, and the point of view of victims is not the main topic for that movie). This comparison is relevant as somebody (mainly the supporters of terrorists, but also people with confused moral principles) object to "Thirteen among a thousand" that it is not told the point of view of terrorists. These people are in favor of a political documentary, "The Basque ball" (2003, by Julio Medem): its director said that he wanted to explain in it all the points of view to the terrorist conflict (mainly with interviews with politicians, but also with the sympathizers with terrorists). It is clear that Medem did not risked his live as Arteta has done, since the supporters of Basque nationalist terrorism were pleased with the "Basque ball". But one question is necessary to be asked: those confused moral principles that claim that all the points of view must be considered, would also claim that interviews with the Nazis should be displayed together with interviews with their victims?