Neo-Realism in Contemporary Bolivian Cinema: a Case Study of Jorge Sanjines's "Blood of the Condor" and Antonio Eguino's "Chuquiago".

This study of the cinematic approaches of two contemporary Bolivian filmmakers, Jorge Sanjines and Antonio Eguino, attempts to correct certain misinterpretations and mislabellings by international film critics of recent Bolivian films through a detailed analysis of Sanjines's Blood of the Condor (1969) and Eguino's Chuquiago (1977). The study contends that Sanjines's film, labelled militant cinema, is, in fact, neo-realistic, and that Eguino's so-called neo-realistic film is neo-realistic only in a limited sense. The true genra of these two films is established by means of a comparative cinematic analysis of the two Bolivian films and the prototypes of neo-realism (Rossellini's Open City) and militant cinema (Solanas's The Hour of the Furnaces). Based on data collected from film viewings, personal interviews with Bolivian filmmakers, and published film criticism, the dissertation consists of four chapters. Chapter I contains an historical overview of Bolivian cinema from its early beginning in the 1900s to the present, set against the background of the country's political and social conditions. The overview demonstrates the preference of Bolivian filmmakers for documentaries about the country's cultural history and its contemporary conditions. Chapter I also gives a series of definitions of neo-realistic and militant cinema which are later used as the st and ard of comparison for the scene-by-scene cinematic analysis of Blood of the Condor in Chapter II and Chuquiago in Chapter III. The study concludes that the definitions of neo-realism apply to Blood of the Condor and those of militant cinema do not; and that Chuquiago is only partly neo-realistic. Why these films have been mislabelled by international critics is explained by pointing up the critics' lack of knowledge of Bolivian film history and , more importantly, their inability to comprehend the political, economic, and cultural realities presented by contemporary Bolivian films--indeed, by Third World films in general. Cinema performs a vital role in Bolivia: it preserves history and questions the "official" reality. In spite of these unique roles--or because of them--the future of Bolivian cinema remains unclear in the face of serious economic problems, recurrent military coups, and regimes that often repress films and filmmakers that criticize the ruling power.PhDFilm studiesUniversity of Michiganhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/159640/1/8324278.pd