Rocha que Voa Page #3

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in So Paulo and students...

It was Costa e Silva's dictatorship,

he was the second dictator...

after Castelo Branco, he had

put president Jango down...

he who was doing

the revolution in 64.

I mean, president Jango was doing

the revolution in 64...

it wasn't Marechal Castelo Branco...

who was a reactionary marshal.

So it was a big mess,

the students on the streets.

The leader was Vladimir Palmeira.

There was Marcos Medeiros...

Elinor Brito, psychoanalyst

Hlio Pellegrino...

Franklin Martins,

all the heavyweight guys.

But it wasn't a revolution,

it was just a commotion...

there was this French too,

it was a big mess.

People used to say that

it was a revolution...

but of the radical middle class,

the liberal, reformist bourgeoisie.

And the workers, there were peasants

starving in the Northeast...

and they're still starving today.

They've been starving for 400 years.

And the intellectuals were there

at Museu de Arte Moderna...

that night, discussing art...

revolutionary art...

because it was the start

of Tropicalism, that big wave.

Then I got to Havana, at ICAIC...

the synchronization was done

by Raul Garcia...

and I edited it with

Tineca and Mireta.

It took me four days to shoot

and four hours to edit...

and synchronize. The title

I chose was "Cncer".

I would love to see that film...

after so many years.

I've never seen it edited.

I remember parts of it.

In 1971, the director at ICAIC,

Alfredo...

asked me to help him

with a film...

that had sound problems.

He had the film rolls...

and the original recordings.

He had been in Italy

and England...

trying to synchronize the sound...

but he wasn't able to do it

in those studios.

I got a take from a person

talking in the foreground.

I rolled the tape

in a different speed...

like that...

and I told him,

"It's a different speed.

It's too slow. It's in sync,

but it's too slow".

And Glauber did like this.

He loved it that it was in sync

but with a different speed.

The quality of Glauber

and the work...

we were working on

had some kind of magic...

nobody would let go of.

The work was feasible,

it was within the idea.

What happens in cinema

is this:

making a movie is a process

both theoretical and practical.

It's an intellectual and technical

production process...

because the technique is also

a form of intellectual production.

Electricity was discovered

by Edison...

cinema was invented

by a working man.

So, Lumire is as important

to cinema...

for having developed its technique

as Eisenstein...

for having created its aesthetics.

So technique and aesthetics...

for instance,

they go hand in hand.

So, when you make a film,

they talk a lot about the director...

but they practically forget...

all the other people

who participated in it.

That in a film where

200 or 300 people participated...

people who will keep anonymous.

You need cameramen,

set designers, editors...

grips, gaffers...

In this process where intellectuals

are servile to the powerful...

the issue of reason...

was also put as something created

by the bourgeoisie society...

to justify its own class ideology.

For this reason,

which is determined...

by a political, a aesthetic

or a philosophical behavior...

the same thing happened

in the cinema.

The cameras were created

and then...

a whole production structure

was created...

a film dramaturgy and a

distribution system was created...

according to this reason.

The whole cinema dramaturgy

was created by imperialism...

it was conventional, according

to the interests of the bourgeoisie.

With a whole psychological,

dramatic scheme...

a behavior... The film

directors were like...

matres d'htel. They just said,

"You sit on the right...

You sit on the left".

So cinema became something

mechanic, boring, useless...

with dramatic conversions,

"I love you" in close-ups...

and something completely absurd

that does not reflect...

the true behavior of men.

People always say that

I film irrational scenes.

And I say they are irrational

in relation...

to the rationalism

of bourgeoisie culture.

For me, the bourgeoisie reason

is what's irrational.

If you give a camera

to a peasant...

or to a worker and tell him

to film his life...

he'll make something different

than an imperialist film.

He'll make a different

kind of film.

Specially if he doesn't have...

the education of bourgeoisie

cinema in his head.

I am doing this

as an intermediary...

because the moment

hasn't come yet...

people haven't had the opportunity

to make cinema.

So, the strange

form of the film...

is due to a closer

interpretation...

of what normal people

would really do.

I think Cuban audiences can

understand the film very well...

because the Cuban people is connected

to the African traditions...

and to the simplicity

of things as well.

Maybe something that might be strange

to a civilized white person...

to a civilized intellectual...

may not seem strange

to a sensitive person...

who is more used to it.

Your film "The Lion Has Seven Heads"

is being shown.

Could you tell us...

what kind of film it is?

It's my first film in Africa...

where you really see

the African political struggle...

from the point of view

of a Latin American man...

coming from the Third Worid,

like me, with African blood.

"The Lion Has Seven Heads"

is a film about...

colonialism in Africa

and the African revolution.

Anyone who has a notion...

about Marxism and

the dialectical method...

will see that the film

is a dialectical discussin...

on the African reality,

based on solid facts...

which provokes new qualities.

And new qualities are

a new kind of language.

So in this film I placed

a camera and a white canvas...

so the people could

express themselves.

So it's a kind of film

where people really...

mark their own scene,

do their dialogues...

which is different than imperialist

cinema, bourgeoisie cinema...

where the director determines,

in his mind...

how people should behave.

The film was improvised.

All the scenes where

the Africans participate...

were created by them.

I explained to them...

the themes, we also

worked with actors...

of different political

inclinations...

and they improvised

the political discussin.

There's no difference

between theater and cinema.

In theater, the representation

happens onstage...

in cinema, it's onscreen. People

judge if it's cinema or not...

because imperialist cinema

created a kind of narrative...

and said that

that was cinema.

But I think you can

switch the camera on...

facing a stage

a let people act.

I was accused of making

an intellectual film...

but who accused me

of being "intellectual"...

were the intellectuals

connected to the bourgeoisie art.

The film is a complete

liberation...

of a dramatic system,

and I think...

that, in this film, I broke

away with the language...

of European cinema

and imperialist cinema.

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