Neruda (2016)
Movie rating 7.5/10
Director:
Pablo Larraín
Writer:
Guillermo Calderón
Stars:
Gael García Bernal, Luis Gnecco, Alfredo Castro
R
| 1h 47min | Biography, Drama
An inspector hunts down Nobel Prize-winning Chilean poet,
Pablo Neruda, who becomes a fugitive in his home country in the late 1940s for
joining the Communist Party.
Read imdb review here
‘Neruda’
Pursues the Poet as Fugitive
“Neruda,”
Pablo Larraín’s semifantastical biopic, is a warmhearted film about a
hot-blooded man that is nonetheless troubled by a subtle, perceptible chill.
Blending fact with invention, it tells the story of a confrontation between an
artist (the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda) and an emerging dictatorship, and more
generally illuminates the endless struggle between political authority and the
creative imagination. For anyone who believes that poetry and democracy spring
from the same source and provoke the same enemies, this movie provides both
encouragement and warning.
It
starts, cameras whirling and swooping, in 1948, with Neruda (Luis Gnecco), a
prominent leftist politician as well as a literary celebrity, in a rhetorical
war with Chile’s president, Gabriel González Videla, an erstwhile ally in the
process of moving from left to right. When Videla bans the Communist Party,
Neruda — who represents that party in the Chilean Senate — goes from opposition
figure to outlaw. Much of “Neruda” is a shaggy-dog cat-and-mouse game, as
Neruda and his wife, Delia (Mercedes Morán), are pursued by Oscar Peluchonneau
(Gael García Bernal), a preening police inspector who stakes his professional
honor on his ability to track down the country’s most f Peluchonneau is an
invented character, a creature conjured from crime fiction and touched with
philosophical melancholy as well as ruthlessness. Whippet-thin and
strait-laced, he stands in dour contrast to Neruda, a plump sensualist with a
robust sense of mischief and an inexhaustible appetite for pleasure. With and
without Delia, the poet manages to stay one step ahead of his nemesis,
executing a series of escapes that seem equally inspired by Hitchcock and those
old Peter Sellers “Pink Panther” movies.
Neruda
also composes “Canto General,” his great, Whitmanesque work on the glories and
miseries of Latin America. Pages are distributed clandestinely, and committed
to memory by workers and peasants. Their popularity, and Neruda’s easygoing
populism, are a rebuke to the arrogance of the ruling class and the Chilean
state. And Mr. Larraín’s eye for the rugged beauty of Chile’s protean
landscapes implies a similar argument. The poet is open to nature and humanity.
The policeman is consumed by rules, tactics and procedures.
Peluchonneau
is a tragically constricted soul, but not an entirely unsympathetic character.
Neruda is a heroic figure — comic and Dionysian, brilliant and naughty — but
his personal Javert is in some ways the film’s protagonist. Neruda is annoyed
and sometimes amused by the detective’s doggedness, but Peluchonneau is haunted
by the poet’s mystique, and by a growing sense of his own incompleteness. A
curious symbiosis develops between them, a dynamic more complex and strange
than the simple conflict of good and evil.
Mr.
Larraín is a master of moral ambiguity. His previous films about Chile — “Tony
Manero,” “No” (which also starred Mr. Bernal) and “The Club” — are interested
in collaboration as well as resistance, in the inner lives of the corrupt as
well as the actions of the virtuous. Those movies, in particular “Tony Manero,”
set during the military dictatorship in the 1970s, and “The Club,” about a
group of disgraced priests, are studies in claustrophobia, with cloudy
cinematography and grubby behavior.
“Neruda”
has a looser story, richer colors and a more buoyant spirit. It is less
abrasive than Mr. Larraín’s Chilean trilogy, and less intensely focused than
“Jackie,” his new English-language film about Jacqueline Kennedy in the
aftermath of her husband’s assassination. But like that unorthodox foray into
history, this one approaches political issues from an oblique angle, looking
for the idiosyncrasies and ironies that humanize the pursuit of ideals and the
exercise of power.
The
period details cast a romantic glow over Neruda’s flight, which feels more
swashbuckling than desperate. But the film casts a shadow forward in time, into
the darkness of Chile’s later, bloodier period of military rule, and beyond
that into the political uncertainties of the present, in Latin America and
elsewhere. Mr. Larraín invites us to believe that history is on the side of the
poets and the humanists, and that art will make fools of politicians and
policemen. But he is also aware, as Pablo Neruda was, that history sometimes
has other plans.
Read full review at New york times
♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝♝
Movie rating ★★★✬
A
poet on the run in startlingly great 'Neruda'
Chilean
director Pablo Larrain is on a hero's quest to destroy the conventional biopic
it seems. He turned the post-assassination days of Jacqueline Kennedy into an
atmospheric examination of mythmaking and the public and private self in
"Jackie," and in "Neruda ," the story of a poet on the run,
into a thrilling meditation on authorship.
The
stories of both Jackie Kennedy and Pablo Neruda are already compelling on their
own, but Larrain manages to go beyond the specifics and get to their essence
through powerfully and uniquely cinematic storytelling. Larrain is not
interested in dramatizing a Wikipedia page, but getting to the truth in spite
of the facts. In this way, even though he explains relatively little, he
reveals quite a lot.
New
York Times Book Review critic Selden Rodman said of Pablo Neruda that "no
writer of world renown is perhaps so little known to North Americans." I
certainly didn't know anything about the Chilean poet, and that fact is likely
inextricably linked with my assessment and enjoyment of the film, but not to
its artistic merits, of which there are many. Neruda was and is that rarest of
creatures — a popular poet of the people.
"This
man would pull a piece of paper out of his pocket and 10,000 workers would go
silent to hear him recite poetry," says one character in the film.
His
communist affiliation made him an enemy of the state in post-WWII Chile,
however, forcing him into exile in 1948.
We're
introduced to Neruda (played by Chilean actor Luis Gnecco, who gives a
tremendous dramatic performance) living life as a communist senator, a poet and
an all-around bon vivant with his aristocratic wife, Delia (Mercedes Moran).
He's pompous and charming and hedonistic and empathetic all at once — but glaringly
disconnected from the people he writes about and for.
When a
warrant is issued for his arrest, Pablo and Delia go on the run away from their
fancy digs and parties and friends and attempt survival in more modest
settings, always fearful of who might be around the corner ready to report them
to the authorities. Pablo sneaks out on occasion to mingle with the local
prostitutes when he's not writing.
On
their tail is a police officer, Inspector Oscar Peluchonneau (Gael Garcia
Bernal), a character who was invented for the story to make it more of a fable.
While "Neruda" starts out a little slow, it kicks into gear with
Oscar's arrival. He's a noir-style detective on the hunt for the exile with
mechanical resolve, but within these genre confines the story manages also to
be immensely playful and insightful, too — about politics, authorship and art —
as it toys with form, tone and story.
There
is a great meta conversation between Oscar and Delia at one point in which
Delia tells Oscar that he is merely a secondary character who is given context
and life only by the man he's pursuing. The artificiality of the self-conscious
exchange is exaggerated by their shifting setting (one moment they're inside
sitting at a table, the next they're outside standing face to face). Larrain
also gives Oscar's pursuit of Neruda an intentionally fake quality by using
rear end projection during shots of him driving. It is silly and looks silly,
but somehow it works, drawing you further into a trance-like state rather that
shaking you out of the movie magic with a cheesy, antiquated technology.
But
again, "Neruda" is more interested in the ineffable experience than
reality, or making you forget you're watching a movie. Not many directors get a
one-two punch like "Jackie" and "Neruda" in the same
season, but it just makes it all the more clear that Larrain is one of the
world's most exciting
Read full review at Daily Mail
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Unconventional drama constructs
rather than retells Chilean poet's life
The basic
formula of the biopic has grown almost unbearably tiresome, thanks largely to
the annual parade of mostly uninspiring Oscarbait true stories that serve to do
nothing but show actors’ “range”. Would the world have stopped spinning if The
Danish Girl or Trumbo had never been released?
As a
response to the repetition, film-makers have been making more “constructed
biopics”, taking elements, ideas and themes then mashing them together to make
something less familiar. Born to be Blue, Joy and, most explicitly, I’m Not
There have all been upfront about their fabricated narrative, the writers and
directors all admitting that some creative license is required to make their
subjects fit the medium.
Pablo
Larrain is no stranger to this technique, employing Gael Garcia Bernal as a
fictional ad man working during the Pinochet referendum in his Oscar-nominated
2012 drama No. He enlists Bernal again in this inventive and entertaining drama
about the poet and senator Pablo Neruda and his time in exile in post-second
world war Chile.
Larrain’s
film is a delicate balancing act and, along with screenwriter Guillermo
Calderón, he avoids both smugness and a sense of artificiality with a playful
tone and a sharp, meta take on the concept of character and story. Neruda,
played by Luis Gnecco who bears a remarkable likeness to the poet, enjoys the
thrill of the chase and sends the detective crime novels which then start to
transform his character and cause him to question who is controlling his
destiny.
It’s also
refreshing to see a biopic that doesn’t deify its subject. Neruda is an
influential idealist and a skilled poet, but he’s also an egotist and a snob.
There’s a fascinating interaction when he’s approached by a fellow Communist
who questions him on his growing status and how his persona is ultimately
against the ideals of the party. Like the character himself, the film never
stays still and is vibrant with ideas and energy.
Similarly,
the detective on Neruda’s trail is anything but a cliche. He’s a man trying to
figure out who his father is by examining his own actions and is torn between
his artistic sensibilities and his more rigid profession. He’s also excited by
the romance of the chase, questioning whether he’s the hero or the supporting
character and the film leads the two characters to a surprisingly poignant
finale.
Neruda
takes a lot of wild chances and, like the poet whose life acts as inspiration,
it’s unwilling to play by the rules. Dizzily constructed and full of more life
and meaning than most “real” biopics, it’s a risk worth taking.
Read full review at The Guardian
The conflicting forces that
shape the Chilean national identity have been an overarching theme in the work
of Pablo Larrain, whether it’s the festering chaos and violence of the Pinochet
regime in Tony Manero, Post Mortem and No, or the moral bankruptcy of the
Catholic church in The Club. The slyly subversive originality of those films
made it a safe bet that the director was never going to be backed into a
conventional bio-drama corner, even by a subject as colossal as that cultural
giant of his homeland, the Nobel Prize-winning poet Pablo Neruda.
The film at times is more
playful than illuminating, but it's also a handsomely crafted and boldly
idiosyncratic contemplation of a great artist for whom political compromise was
anathema. That should ensure that it continues to expand Larrain's
international footprint as one of the most distinctive Latin American directors
to emerge in the past decade.
Larrain and Calderon show
limited interest in following the standard biographical steps. Instead, they
build intrigue by creating an obsessive central relationship between Neruda and
Oscar Peluchonneau (Gael Garcia Bernal), the ambitious but dim detective
assigned to hunt him down. Peluchonneau's needling thoughts heard in voiceover
provide the story's connective thread. As much as the film is about a poet in
flight, remaking himself as a symbolic hero of the people, it's also about a
nobody of dubious origins, determined to make his name count by measuring
himself against a man of greatness.
Clever use of back projection
in scenes with Peluchonneau in pursuit on a motorcycle underscores the
intention to coax a story from the poet's (and by extension, the filmmakers')
imagination as much as from history. Composer Federico Jusid's classic mystery
score, with its agitated bursts of Bernard Herrmann-style strings, also
reinforces the drama's placement in a fictionalized realm.
Gnecco and Bernal appeared
together in Larrain's No, and both register strongly in their roles here. Their
myth-making characters' contrasting presences — one a big, doughy man who
acquires authority and seductive power through his words, the other a wiry,
hungry type, consumed by the need to define himself and outrun his insecurities
— give the film a lively duality. On one hand, it's the story of an artist
adding fuel to his already outsized legend, and on the other, a driven man
refusing to be a supporting character in someone else's plot.
Moran does fine work as
Neruda's wife, her unconditional love never masking the melancholy awareness
that her brilliant husband is also a vain, selfish man, too fixated on his
public persona and legacy ever to be entirely hers. One particularly memorable
scene follows their breakup, when Peluchonneau tracks Delia down and she tells
him, with soothing condescension, that he will never be a protagonist in
Neruda's story. Larrain regular Castro also makes an incisive impression in his
small role as Videla.
The movie looks superb. Sergio
Armstrong's cinematography lacquers the faded haze of the past over the
widescreen images (the sprawling landscapes of the final section are
particularly stunning) and drapes noir-toned shadows over the interiors in
Peluchonneau's scenes; production designer Estefania Larrain fills the artsy
homes, bohemian clubs and bordellos with rich detail.
This is a strange film that
tonally is sometimes hard to pin down. With its reams of prose-like voiceover,
it can be simultaneously beguiling and distancing, sketching a portrait of an
iconic cultural figure while at the same time rendering him enigmatic, almost
unknowable. And yet the relationships are riveting, notably that of Neruda and
Peluchonneau, despite them having almost no shared screen time. Their dynamic
gives physical life to the eternally fascinating dividing lines separating
history from legend, and in this case, from contemporary reinvention.
Read full review at Hollywood Reporter
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