Tuesday, April 3, 2018
458 - Y Tu Mama Tambien, Mexico, 2001. Dir. Alfonso Cuaron
Alfonso Cuaron is a storyteller.
He tells the big story, the one we call the plot, but he tells the little stories. The side stories. The background stories. The things that go on behind the scenes.
He tells the plot through the action of the film.
He tells other stories two other ways. Through the voice-over of the narrator. And through the action of peripheral and background characters.
Which is his point.
Why does a man live on the periphery? Or in the background? And to whom is he peripheral? To whom is he background? His life is not peripheral to him. His world is not background to him.
In Alfonso Cuaron's world, everyone's life is important.
The family maid, where she was born, and how she came to work for the family. The stooped old man approaching the table for alms. The person in the window of the apartment across the alley. The bride observing an old tradition, playing a queen by the side of the road. The driver pulled over by the police. The family accosted by government raiders on their own farm. Student demonstrators. The pedestrian hit by a bus whose body was not claimed for four days. The couple for whom the crosses mark the place of their death ten years ago. The fisherman who is driven off his land by the construction of a resort and who becomes a janitor and never fishes again. The 98-year old woman who remembers the details of her life since she was 5. The baby.
And like the 98-year old woman, for Cuaron all the details of all the lives of all the people in all the world from birth to death are important. Because people are important.
Cuaron cares about economics. He follows the lives of the privileged wealthy while repeatedly drawing attention to the poor around them. And he comments on how the political and economic conditions of the country have a direct bearing on the lives of the people.
He is interested in the things that he has his protagonists resist. Economics--Tenoch refuses to take an economics class despite his father's threat that if he does not he will lose his car. He loses his car. Philosophy and politics--When the boys try to guess what Luisa does for a living, she laughs and tells of how her husband's friends expect her to know those things but she cannot keep up. And does not really want to.
Yet despite their lack of interest in political and economic theory, the three protagonists exemplify what Cuaron may be promoting as a practical and spiritual way of life.
Every time someone asks them for a donation or alms, they give it. Smilingly. Willingly. Joyfully. While all around them people are taking advantage of each other for profit. That seems to be the point he really wants to make.
Cuaron is interested in how people form sustainable societies. He is interested in love and fidelity and family and fear.
Yet he hides these things behind the exploits and braggadocio of two teenage boys in search of a good time and with a longing for the ultimate Summer road trip.
Because Tenoch has money, and because Julio hangs out with him, they have access to all the alcohol and recreational drugs they desire. And girlfriends who are generous with them.
But their girlfriends are spending the Summer in Italy. And the boys are finding themselves bored. Despite private access to the country club and required attendance at a marriage where the President is in attendance.
Until Luisa comes along. Luisa is the wife of Tenoch's cousin Alejandro, known to family as Jano. Tenoch wants to be a writer, but Jano really is one. We know he is because he tells us so. Jano is published. He asks Tenoch if he has read his book, and Tenoch replies that he has read the reviews. Ouch. Jano says critics do not know anything.
Luisa is a loving and faithful wife, and she is too old for these silly boys. At least ten years older. The age at which a woman named Mabel will later tell her she should start having children.
But Luisa knows something no one else knows. Not Jano. Not the boys. And not us.
And Jano gives her a call one night that propels her to get away.
Creating the most unlikely of companions on this ultimate Summer road trip.
Luisa has one thing going on in the presence of the boys while in the car and another in the privacy of her hotel rooms.
And we will not fully realize it until the end of the film.
The film is portrayed as an erotic adventure movie. It is after all named for the boys' braggadocio, as they list their (mostly made-up) exploits. ". . . and your Mama too!"
And the three companions are indeed primed for an explosion of the forces that are simmering beneath the surface. Just like that shooting sprinkler jet on the country club green.
A with C. B with C. A with B. A with B with C.
And you can watch the film on that level and appreciate all that goes on inside the hotel rooms and inside the car.
But do not neglect to look out the windows.
Because the story Alfonso Cuaron really wants you to see is taking place in the greater world outside.
In the world you that thought was the periphery.
In the world that you thought was the background.
* * * * *
"I won't win an Oscar."
Alfonso Cuaron is reading a newspaper.
"Like our soccer players. We'll lose, but we'll make a good effort."
Cuaron did in fact not win. But he was nominated for Best Original Screenplay. For what he does best.
Alfonso Cuaron is a storyteller.
And in a time of tremendous attention on international cinema, the Mexican Cuaron "lost" to the Spanish Pedro Almodovar, for Talk to Her, and was nominated alongside the Canadian Greek Nia Vardalos for My Big Fat Greek Wedding.
Y Tu Mama Tambien also did well for the careers of its leads, Diego Luna, Gael Garcia Bernal, and Maribel Verdu.
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