Eisenstein in Guanajuato Page #2

If anything happens to him,

you'll be picking ice

out of your asses in Siberia

or have an ice-pick lodged in your brain!

(CLASSICAL MUSIC)

Here, your photographs.

Put them away somewhere safe.

Don't leave them lying around

for innocent chambermaids

to steal and show to their mams, hmm?

But they are paintings.

PALOMINO:
Mexican mothers

protecting their innocent daughters.

We countered by accusing the maid

of stealing from guests.

Is thievery worse than voyeurism?

She should not be sacked for curiosity.

You must get her reinstated.

(SCOFFS)

She's in the bar

with her mother and her father.

- You could tell her yourself.

- No, you tell her.

And tell her mother

her daughter's forgiven for stealing,

and from now on, she's the only one

to bring me my breakfast in bed

in the morning.

(SCOFFS)

(SCOFFS)

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

The manager says it's a good job

she didn't take a look

in your red suitcase.

Oh? What's in the red suitcase?

Enough to have you thrown in jail.

And how did the manager

know what was in the red suitcase?

After the complaint, he searched everything.

God, he has no right to do that.

That's invasion of privacy!

Shh. Look, he's winking at you.

Curiously, it's a mark in your favour.

But if you offend him,

he could use it against you.

Tread carefully.

(CLASSICAL MUSIC)

The Camorristas.

They are looking for

wealthy foreigners to prey on.

They wait outside all the big hotels.

And you are giving them

good reason to prey on you.

That's why you have bodyguards.

These are the small-time guys.

We don't worry so much about them.

They are posing as tough guys,

but they are lazy.

The big guys are much tougher.

And the real big guys, you'll never see.

That's why you should try

and stop attracting attention.

Don't get yourself photographed

and in the newspapers.

If they smell a ransom possibility,

they will be in and kidnap you.

How much do you think you are worth?

Not much.

What will your government pay

to keep you alive?

SERGEI:
Nothing.

Just trust that we are looking

after you properly.

But maybe you are a Camorrista?

If I am, then you are lost.

(LAUGHING)

You ought to make a film about them.

The corpse at the door is wearing a red shirt,

as you can see.

Even among the dead,

the Camorristas have influence.

Ransoming a corpse

is not uncommon in Mxico.

(CLASSICAL MUSIC)

Aah!

(PALOMINO LAUGHING)

Mralo.

(LAUGHING)

Do you only have one suit?

Well, I left Moscow with only $25.

Russia has very little foreign currency,

and that was all they could afford to give us.

I get paid expenses here in Mexico.

Or I get paid expenses,

and I have to share with Tisse and Grisha.

That suit is taking some punishment.

You should buy yourself another.

SERGEI:
It's my first American suit.

I bought it to walk down Sunset Boulevard

with Charlie Chaplin.

It's a sentimental matter.

I could not part with it.

This is my wife, Concepcin.

- This is Rolando.

- Good evening, sir.

Good evening.

The eldest was born

when I was studying troubadours

and the second, Pascal,

when I reluctantly gave up God.

Now I don't believe in God, but I miss him,

as did Pascal.

I'm sorry. I have no Russian buttons.

But these are curious. What are they made of?

SERGEI:
Ah. Gunmetal.

They are stamped out

of discarded cartridge cases,

pierced with two holes

and glued to a piece of army blanket,

which usually very quickly becomes unglued.

(PALOMINO AND CONCEPCION CHUCKLE)

A Russian soldier is told

never to let his shoes out of his sight,

if not out of his hand.

Better still, always keep them on your feet.

Shoes are the most precious item of clothing.

Won't help your modesty,

scarcely keep you warm,

but you will simply not be able

to function without shoes

in any way at all.

Don't worry. I'm a foreigner.

I'm a child abroad.

Russia's so big

that nobody thinks about abroad.

It's always too far away and well out of sight.

- (CHUCKLES)

- We believe most of the time

that "abroad" does not really exist.

Does not really exist. Does not really exist.

I was earning money

from American publishers,

and I bought an old battered Ford car.

Mayakovsky had a Renault,

and we raced around Moscow

at 40 miles an hour with our windows down,

shouting, singing,

- and mooning.

- Oh!

He had a nice arse. My arse was way too fat.

He got his car impounded for moral turpitude.

Mayakovsky, that is, not his car.

His car was innocent.

Is this car, with Death in the driver's seat,

completely innocent?

No fat on his backside.

In 1927, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks

of Universal Pictures,

Charlie Chaplin's company,

saw Potemkin and invited me

to come to Hollywood

to make a film! Hooray! Hooray! Hooray!

(CHILDREN CHEERING)

I met them all. All those Hollywood guys.

They all came to Moscow.

Would you believe it?

Joseph Schenck lost in Russia,

but he looked like a Russian smoothie.

All Jews look lost in Russia,

but there is never a better home for them.

He fast-smoked big cigars.

He was a caricature.

It was to make sure no one took him seriously

so he could take everyone else seriously

when they weren't looking.

I am a caricature. I don't smoke fast,

but I can talk fast, don't you think?

Joseph Schenck

came with a Hollywood contract

in his pocket, which was soon in my pocket.

And then my pockets were filled

with Hollywood happiness.

Felicidad Hollywoodus.

(CLASSICAL MUSIC)

To get to Hollywood,

you must first pass through Europe,

and then you have to pass through America

because Hollywood is a separate country

all on its very own.

So like bug-eyed cultural tourists,

we went through Europe,

looking, seeing, shaking hands.

Although it was more like

shaking hands and looking.

I had eyes in my hands,

and they never stopped shaking.

We met George Grosz and Man Ray

and Dos Passes.

Oh, Kthe Kollwitz.

She had at least half a way

for social conscience,

though her droopy face and sagging breasts

were overplayed as a sort of trademark.

And Le Corbusier,

who said I reminded him of Donatello.

All architects love cinema.

We met Lger and Cocteau

and Marinetti, who was a fool.

Terrible poetry, worse painting.

Oh, we met James Joyce,

who sat through Battleship Potemkin

in his dark blind glasses.

I imagine he did not see a thing.

We met Abel Gance and Buuel.

And Al Jolson, the blacked-up

singing son of a Russian rabbi.

- This one.

- (GRUNTS)

We saw Dal's Le Chien Andalou

and Dreyer's Joan of Arc.

I went to Holland, where a crowd of reporters

met me at Rotterdam airport.

They were all very excited.

They had come expecting to meet Einstein.

(BOTH LAUGHING)

We had von Sternberg in Babelsberg.

And he was shooting The Blue Angel

with Marlene Dietrich.

(SPEAKING GERMAN)

We were all the time

being watched and followed

by two Russian agents.

One looked like Fatty Arbuckle

and the other one looked like Buster Keaton.

One was rosy and laughing

and always fingering his backside,

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