Almodóvar and Americanized Culture

            Tonight, I went with my host family to take in Julieta, the riveting new picture by Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar. Anybody who has known me for at least 53 seconds knows that I adore the cinema, and so I was excited to go (and pleased with how much I understood without the aid of subtitles). However, a thought soon struck me. Julieta was, in fact, the only film that was made in the Spanish language playing at the multiplex. All the others were English-language films from the last couple of years, mostly American releases from what I could tell. Even Julieta was filmed, produced, and set in Spain, not in Latin America, let alone Bolivia. I understand that Bolivia has more pressing concerns than growing any indigent film industry it might possess, but it appears that Bolivia is absent its own popular culture. In the United States, we take for granted that we can go to any theater and see a movie without worrying about dubbing or subtitles. I doubt I would have become the serious (to the point of annoying) film buff that I am if I had had to read my films rather than view them. It is often overlooked how important a common culture is to establishing a coherent nation. Now, it’s not as though having a favorite “so-bad-it’s-good” Nicolas Cage film is crucial to an American’s identity, but we all know Rocky’s theme song and most will try out their best Marlon Brando impression at a christening without fail. There is something specifically American about these shared references, just as there is something uniquely British about Doctor Who and something crucially French about Jean-Luc Godard. At any rate, Bolivia is in this respect a kind of cultural no-man’s-land. Apart from a few reality/competition shows and the news, most of television and film derives from the United States, Mexico, Argentina, or maybe Great Britain. Even the soap operas dutifully watched at lunchtime on Unitel are optioned Peruvian or Turkish programs (which still confounds me). At any rate, I could only assume that this absence of definite Bolivian cultural touchstones is one among many factors as to why Bolivians, centuries after colonization, still identify so strongly with their respective indigenous groups, whose cultures are defined and shared. It is difficult to point to a cultural artefact and definitively state that something is undeniably and integrally Bolivian. Not Aymara, not Quechua, not Spanish, but intrinsically and solely Bolivian. With these fractured cultures, Bolivia is set to remain a greatly fractured state, and, who knows, movies could be a first step to greater social cohesion. At any rate, these were the thoughts swirling in my head as I sat in my chair as an American, surrounded by Bolivians, ready to watch a European film.

            As an aside, I can heartily recommend Julieta for anyone staying a few more days, as it is not due to have a wide release in the United States. The narrative style is a bit disjointed, and the cinematography is nothing to write home about, unusual for Almodóvar, who is typically Kurosawa-like in his ability to set a mood by tonal lighting. Nevertheless, the film represents a welcome return to form for the Spanish master filmmaker, following his disastrous comedy The Passengers.