MADRID, Aug. 18 (Reuters Life!) - British scriptwriter Paul Laverty, a long-time collaborator with director Ken Loach, tackles the Spanish Conquest of Latin America in his latest film and the present plight of its poor Indian population.
"Even the rain", to be premiered at the upcoming Toronto International Film Festival, begins by portraying the making of a period film in Bolivia about Christopher Columbus’ pioneering voyages to the Americas.
The plot then covers how the film-makers and cast are caught up in latter-day violent protests in 2000, against Bolivian government plans which could have forced peasants to pay for water they had previously obtained for free.
The plot has a further twist, because an extra in the fictional film is also leading protests.
Laverty decided to twin past and present with the focus on social issues he has used in his work in making films with Loach such as "The Wind that Shakes the Barley", which won the Palme d’Or prize at the 2005 Cannes festival.
"For many years I’ve been fascinated by this idea of Columbus and what he set in motion, looking for gold and slavery," Laverty said in an interview in Madrid, where he lives with Iciar Bollain, the new film’s Spanish director.
"They once were taking slaves and now through international instruments, law and contracts, they’re privatising the most precious resource of all, even the rain, which is where we get the title from," he added.
Shot in 33 days in Bolivia with a modest budget of 5 million euros, the film stars Mexican actor Gael Garcia Bernal but otherwise the cast are not professionals.
"That makes it very demanding, but in return they give you a lot of enthusiasm and willingness you don’t always find here," Bollain added.
FOOTBALL FANS EVOKE COLUMBUS
Laverty recalled that Spanish football fans waved banners with Columbus’ name in the recent World Cup, which showed how much people still identify with what he said were one-sided accounts of history told from the conquerors’ point of view.
To tell the story differently, he introduces a legendary Indian chief — Hatuey — who died fighting Spanish conquerors, as well as Spanish priests who opposed the poor treatment of Indigenous Americans by their conquerors.
"If you tell a cowboy film with John Wayne and you’re fighting the Indians in the plains of the United States, who’s your hero in that film? It’s not very difficult," he said.
"So what we’re doing in this film with the choice of characters is celebrating the whole notion of resistance," he added. "It challenges the narrative you’ve created of your own history."
A key character in the film is Spanish friar Bartolome de las Casas, who early in the 16th century publicised the mistreatment of the Indians, for which he has a city named after him in modern Mexico but is barely known in Spain.
"I’m amazed there’s not been a single film of Bartolome de las Casas, or at least none that I’m aware of," Laverty said. "He was a much more fascinating, interesting, intelligent and contradictory character (than Columbus)."
Laverty has also recently penned "Route Irish", about the Iraq war, which was screened at Cannes this year but is not yet on general release.
He plans to team up with Loach once again next spring to make a contemporary film in his native Scotland. "It’ll have a bit of black comedy, I hope. Route Irish was a tough one, so it’s time for a change of tone," he said.
