Contemporary Peruvian Cinema

History, Identity and Violence on Screen

Sarah Barrow

• Publisher: I.B. Tauris
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781838608200
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Latin American & Caribbean History
• Index: History

WINNER OF A CHOICE OUTSTANDING ACADEMIC TITLE AWARD 2019 The political violence that erupted towards the end of the twentieth century between the Peruvian state and militant group `Shining Path' left an indelible mark on the country that resonates even today. This study explores representations of the insurgency on screen, and asks what these tell us about the relationship between state, fiction cinema and identity in Peru. In the process, Sarah Barrow highlights the Peruvian experience as a paradigm for the wider study of film-making in societies faced with violence and terrorism.
This book provides in-depth analyses of the pivotal films from the 1980s through to the present day that interpret the events, characters and consequences of the bloody conflict. Setting the films in the context of a time of turbulent transition for both Peruvian society and cinema - addressing developments in film policy and production - it reveals the attempts by filmmakers to reflect, shape, define and contest the identity of a fractured population. By interrogating important themes such as memory, trauma and cultural responses to terrorism, chapters explore local perception of nationhood, and highlight links to other Latin American cinemas and global issues. Featuring discussions of the work of Francisco Lombardi, Marianne Eyde, Fabrizio Aguilar and Josue Mendez, amongst others, this detailed investigation of the growing success and political importance of the industry's output traces the complexities of modern Peruvian history.

1

Cinema, State and National Identity

A survey of the major trends in the history of Peruvian cinema suggests that the relationship between the emergence of the moving image as a popular form, changes on the social and political landscape, and the development of national identity formation in Peru have been complex, contradictory and at odds with developments elsewhere. It has been suggested that the advent of cinema at the end of the nineteenth century coincided in most parts of the world with the period when modernity was already ‘at full throttle … a watershed moment in which a series of sweeping changes in technology and culture created distinctive new modes of thinking about and experiencing time and space’.¹ However, the reality for the majority of Latin American countries was quite different. As Ana M. López points out, it simply is not possible to link the rise of cinema in this region to ‘previous large-scale transformations of daily experience resulting from urbanization, industrialization, rationality and the technological transformation of modern life’.² Such transformations were only just starting to take place, so that when cinema, the ultimate expression of cultural modernity, was launched across the world, the positive consequences of modernity in Latin America were ‘above all a fantasy and a profound desire’.³ Accordingly, the specific historical trajectory and circumstances of cinema in Peru and its impact (both as an agent of social change and as a reflection of the nation) need to be taken fully into account when analysing the contemporary films that are relevant to this study. This chapter reviews some of the key developments in the history of Peruvian cinema, highlights landmark films, considers its relationship with the state and society, and interrogates its contribution to building and reflecting a sense of national identity.

According to Bedoya’s account based on newspaper reports of the time, the arrival of cinema in Peru was warmly welcomed in Lima, in particular by the capital’s social elite, who greeted the new technology as the very incarnation of the modernity to which they aspired. The first public screening in Peru took place in the capital city on 2 January 1897, using the Vitascope equipment developed by the acclaimed North American inventor Thomas Edison. It was attended by President of the Republic Nicolás de Piérola and consisted of two hours of rural and urban views. Electric power had to be specially installed and there was musical accompaniment using a phonograph, also a novelty for Peruvian spectators. When the Lumière brothers’ French cinematograph invention arrived one month later, audiences were able to enjoy much improved picture quality, wider screen formats and topics which celebrated movement and technology. For the most part, the early Peruvian film spectator was affluent and belonged to Lima’s aristocratic society, itself largely modelled upon the European way of life.⁴ Moreover, Piérola was inspired in the reconstruction of his capital city by the images of Paris that he saw on screen. For him, the capital of France was an iconic city of modern sophistication, with its grand spacious boulevards and fashionable inhabitants, that he would attempt to emulate.⁵ As for domestic film production, Piérola’s regime (1895–1899) privileged and encouraged the newsreel and documentary forms as modes of expression ideally suited to flaunting the efforts made by the so-called Aristocratic Republic to modernise and expand its capital using funds raised from the export of its sugar, cotton, rubber, wool and silver. Furthermore, many of the early moving images made in Peru coincided with the first aviation flights in the country, with images of Lima taken from the air aimed at provoking a sense of communal pride at such overt displays of progress and modernity.

Demographic changes accompanied these technological and economic developments, with the emergence of an urban-industrial society that gave rise to new social groups such as the middle class, the industrial bourgeoisie and the working class. Nevertheless, for some time, the nation continued to be ruled by the aristocratic elite, and participation in political decisions was restricted to the most privileged strata of society. Indeed, by the time that cinema was introduced in Peru, still only 5% of the population had the right to vote. Modernisation and political agency had not yet reached the majority of the Peruvian people. Gradually, however, some of the authoritarian values and principles of colonialism were rejected, and gave way to the more positivist and liberal ideas of twentieth-century Europe. From 1900 onward, the middle classes became an important political force, often by forming strategic alliances with farm and factory workers. The complex issue of indigenous rights became vital as interest was sparked in specific Latin American cultural identities, and more populist, nationalist regimes were established which ‘sought to initiate a process of change which … democratized the political structures’.⁶

During the first half of the twentieth century, cinema from the US, Mexico and Europe became increasingly popular with Peruvian audiences, while attempts to create a national film industry were compromised by political tensions and economic constraints. Construction of film exhibition spaces emerged as the first commercial priority, and a small number of companies were established by Peruvian businessmen who were eager to take financial advantage of the opportunities provided by distributing and screening foreign films in Peru. At around the same time, production of documentaries by local filmmakers was regularised, as these were used as ‘fillers’ to complement screenings of foreign feature films. Most concentrated on celebrating urban Lima society, and several were sponsored by the state to record events such as the grand carnivalesque celebrations held annually in Lima to commemorate Peruvian Independence (1821) and the battles of Junín and Ayacucho (1824). In some of them, President Augusto Leguía (1919–1930) was depicted speaking proudly of the growing grandeur and wealth of his country, sharing his vision of long-lasting prosperity thanks to collaboration with foreign capital and technology. As Bedoya explains, early national cinema in Peru found itself ‘firmly attached to official ideology and history’.⁷ Such films ignored the realities of hardship and social exclusion that prevailed throughout the country, especially outside Lima, and sidestepped the tensions between nationalism and cosmopolitanism that marked Peruvian culture during the 1920s.⁸

Notwithstanding, these state-sanctioned films served as nation-builders in that they offered uncritical images of people sharing the celebration of a common history and contributed to the imagining of a nation that ‘regardless of the actual inequality and exploitation that may prevail … [was] conceived as a deep, horizontal comradeship’.⁹ As Larrain points out, ‘the power of an entertaining spectacle transmitted through images is very useful to create and maintain traditions that boost national feelings’.¹0 But despite strong governmental support for the documentary form, Peruvian cinema generally lagged behind: by the 1920s, as much of the rest of the world embraced the introduction of sound to the moving image medium, Peruvian filmmakers were only just beginning to grapple with the production of the nation’s first silent features. Such delay highlighted the pro found lack of technological resources, ongoing investment and experienced filmmakers in a country still struggling with the pressures of industrialisation and the complications of social fragmentation. Leguía’s approach to modernisation was, it turned out, simply to block any radical change that would benefit the lower social classes, and to open the country to further investment by US companies.¹¹

In stark contrast with the relationship between government and cinema in the field of documentary, Peru’s first fiction films were quietly critical of the regime’s national vision and in particular of the impact of Western-style progress on the social majority. They privileged instead the more traditional life experienced by the indigenous and mestizo (mixed race) masses living in provincial towns and rural communities, and thus presented a challenge to the very idea of a coherent, stable and homogeneous national identity that was at the heart of the regime’s quest for recognition as a modern state. Camino de la venganza/The Road to Revenge (Luis Ugarte and Narciso Rada, 1922), for example, focuses provocatively on the opposition between rural and urban life and values, contrasting the supposed innocence of the former with the apparent corruptive forces of the latter. It tells a simple story of cruelty and revenge, depicting the kidnap of a young innocent girl from a highland community by a villainous military captain, who carries her off to the dangers and temptations of the capital city. The sense of conflict is established between a morally idyllic rural life, where work on the land alternates with collective gatherings for eating and dancing, and the dangers of Lima, a city replete with threat and temptation.¹² In reality, while Lima was regarded by some as a site for dreams and opportunities, in contrast to the impoverished countryside, for others it quickly became a place where poor immigrants from the provinces would be forced to submit to various forms of exploitation and humiliation. This conflict between urban and rural cultural values echoed the political stance of the indigenista movement which emerged in Peru during the 1920s, as it did in other Latin American countries with large indigenous communities. This movement, founded on the influential work of political organiser and cultural critic José Carlos Mariátegui, spoke out in favour of a return to indigenous, Andean values and customs, and a rejection of the European cultural heritage that he believed had been imposed violently upon the countries of Latin America.¹³ Moreover, the focus on the tension between urban and rural life was thereafter to become a recurrent theme of Peruvian cinema, as in other cultural forms. Indeed, the complexities of cultural encounter between different social groups from different parts of Peru with different relationships to the state are investigated in the corpus of films under discussion in this study.

By the 1930s, governments and political leaders worldwide had become acutely aware of cinema’s capacity to influence the thoughts and actions of their citizens as well as to delight the upper classes, and they tried to harness it as the ideal medium through which to convey their aims and aspirations. In Peru, President Luis M. Sánchez Cerro (1930–1933) proposed legislation that supported the creation of a touring cinema school, a sort of ‘mobile cinema service with the aim of incorporating the indigenous population into the nation’.¹⁴ Cinema thus became central to the ambitious project of spreading mass education throughout the country and mobilising an overarching sense of national identity formation imposed by the state. The mobile units and their stock of ‘instructional’ films were to be financed by the taxes received by the censorship board in return for classification of films. However, the project soon collapsed as audiences paid little attention to images sent from Lima that bore little relevance to their own lives. Nevertheless, the strictly instrumental and pedagogic approach to the development of a national cinema in Peru was one that would be taken up again a few decades later with more effective results.

Film activity in Peru virtually ground to a halt during the 1930s as the national economy, largely dependent upon the export of its raw materials, was devastated by the Wall Street crash. Attempts were made to sustain production by a handful of key individuals but even these projects failed in such unstable circumstances. Later that decade, the production company Amauta Films was established. Named after the journal founded by the aforementioned Mariátegui, it continues to hold an important place in the history of Peruvian national cinema and influenced one of the directions this would take in reflecting and shaping a sense of national identity that harked back to a focus on the rural and indigenous way of life. As the government of the time, led by General Benavides (1933–1939), became ever more repressive and intent on aggressive modernisation of the country, Amauta Films made feature-length movies that offered a sentimental view of traditional middle- and working-class life in the barrios of Lima, which presented a challenge to the sense of nationhood desired by Benavides. These were popular in some areas since they depicted local issues, but competition from the more glamorous fare offered by the US, Italy and Mexico in particular – countries whose film industries were actively supported by their governments – eventually contributed to the demise of the company at the end of the 1930s.

Apart from a handful of notable exceptions, the few Peruvian films that were made from the 1940s to the 1970s tended to reproduce the conventions of popular European or US movies and were lacking in any distinctive local colour or national sentiment; indigenous communities were almost completely absent from the screen.¹⁵ Films were amateurish and unsophisticated in quality, production was sporadic, and commercial investment was reserved for the distribution and exhibition of foreign film...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Plates
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction: Peruvian Cinema and Culture
• 1. Cinema, State and National Identity
• 2. Cinema, Transition and Turmoil
• 3. Cinema, Oppression and Ideology, 1992–2000
• 4. Cinema, Memory and Truth, 2000–2004
• 5. New Generations and Open Wounds, 2005–2 016
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Filmography
• Index
• eCopyright