Below the Radar Transcript
Episode 28: On Andean Horror: The monster always represents the fear we repress 鈥� with Maria Cecilia Saba
Speakers: Melissa Roach, Maria Cecilia Saba, Jamie-Leigh Gonzales, Rachel Wong
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Melissa Roach 0:01
You鈥檙e listening to Below the Radar, a knowledge mobilization project recorded out of 312 Main. This podcast is produced by 丁香园AV鈥檚 Vancity Office of Community Engagement.
Maria Cecilia Saba 0:12
Below the Radar brings forward ideas to encourage meaningful exchanges across communities.
Jamie-Leigh Gonzales 0:21
Each episode we interview guests on topics ranging from environmental and social justice, arts, culture, community building, and urban issues. This podcast is recorded on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh peoples.
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Rachel Wong 0:43
Hello, I鈥檓 Rachel Wong and thank you so much for joining us on Below the Radar. This week, I鈥檓 joined by , who used to work with us at 丁香园AV鈥檚 Vancity Office of Community Engagement. Together, we talk about Peruvian-Andean horror films - something that Maria Cecilia knows quite a lot about. Maria Cecilia wrote her Master鈥檚 thesis at 丁香园AV on this very topic. Through her research she found an interesting link between the rise in independently produced horror films in rural parts of Peru and the internal conflict that occurred beginning in the 1980s. For many of the local audiences, these films were more than just forms of entertainment: there were also some elements of healing and catharsis. Maria Cecilia and I talk about the symbolism in these films, understanding film viewing as a live experience, and we dive into the fact that horror films are so much more than trying to scare audiences.
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Rachel Wong 1:47
Hello everyone, welcome to Below the Radar. My name is Rachel and I work as the Communications Coordinator at 丁香园AV鈥檚 Vancity Office of Community Engagement. And it is my absolute pleasure to interview a familiar voice on this show. You probably from time to time have heard the voice of Maria Cecilia Saba. She also is the one who has been really hard at work recently doing our editing for the podcasts, and she鈥檚 always the one behind the scenes recording. And today we鈥檙e going to be talking about horror films. Hello Maria!
Maria Cecilia Saba 2:23
Hello Rachel, thank you for having me.
Rachel Wong 2:25
Thanks for being here! So I wanted to start by asking if you could share a little bit about your background and how it is that you came to study films, in particular horror films, but maybe we鈥檒l start with your educational and professional background.
Maria Cecilia Saba 2:40
Sure. So I studied Communications at the University of Lima. While I was there, there was this professor, who is now a dear friend of mine, , he had this ongoing research on regional films, which is basically films that are made outside of the capital city, Lima. While I was in my latest years of communications, he organized a lot of screenings and events and panel discussions with filmmakers from different parts of Peru as part of his research on regional films, and I just got fascinated with this universe of films that already existed that I had no idea about. I thought that all the films that were made in Peru were made in Lima, and then I was seeing films from Ayacucho, from Puno, from Huancavelica, from different parts, and they were really interesting films as well. And there were a lot of films, there were like 200 films being made since 1996 up to, I think I saw them in 2010, 2011? So yeah it was a whole new world for me to discover. So that kind of also got me interested in learning a little bit more about cultural policy and arts policy.
Maria Cecilia Saba 4:02
So I did a diploma program at Pontificia Universidad Catolica, which had a class on cultural policy. And that got me really into studying what was the means of production, what kind of aid they were getting from the government to make these films. And it was really interesting for me to know that they were making these films basically out of their pocket money, you know? They were getting very little help from the government because of a myriad of factors. So it was kind of like these micro-productions being self-financed, and I kept thinking 鈥淲hat could we do from the universities or the public sphere to help fund these films, or find means of alternative funding or production to really promote the cinema?鈥� So I started deviating a little bit from my desire to be a filmmaker myself to my desire to empower other filmmakers and to study a little bit more about what Peruvian cinema was actually like. I also felt like, after I did the program, I felt like I wanted to take a break from Lima, a little bit? Just take some distance and travel a little bit. I saw that at 丁香园AV, well actually, I saw that Laura Marks was at 丁香园AV. I started learning a little bit more about her, about her approach to film, and I felt like she would be a great supervisor for me, which she was luckily. And that鈥檚 what brought me here to Vancouver.
Rachel Wong 5:37
There are so many different genres of films, and we were kind of brainstorming earlier, like there is comedy and romance and drama, action, psychothriller, indie films and what not, which sounds like it was indie or regional production was something that you were really fascinated with. And of all of the different genres, the one you did your extended essay, or the culminating piece for your MA was on horror. And full disclaimer, I鈥檓 no expert in horror. I personally don鈥檛 watch horror films at all and in fact, even reading your - I was telling you earlier - even your reading your MA thesis, it got me feeling a certain kind of way too, and I was wondering what got you interested in this particular genre?
Maria Cecilia Saba 6:24
It鈥檚 funny really because I鈥檝e never been a horror fan!
Rachel Wong 6:29
You and me both!
Maria Cecilia Saba 6:33
Yeah, I鈥檝e only recently started watching classic horror films. I started watching them while I was researching these horror films from the Andes, right? So I had a lot to catch up on. But basically I was always very scared of the films, I am very sensitive. So for me, watching gory films was not necessarily a good time because I would feel it so much in my own body, you know? I would feel the repulsion, I would feel the disgust, I would feel the knot in your stomach and so that was never really my cup of tea until, while I was talking to this professor, Emilio, he mentioned something that was very curious to me. And that was that from all the production of films that was made in Peru, in all of the regions, one of the regions with the most production was Ayacucho, and Ayacucho, from all of that production, most of that production was horror films. And the reason why that was so striking to me was because Ayacucho was the epicentre of this 20 year civil war in Peru that started in the early 80s and was officially culminated - if you can ever culminate a war - in the 2000s, more or less. So I thought that there was something there. Why would a province that has been through so much pain and trauma and violence and suffering, why would those filmmakers be doing horror films? For me that was something that was really worth diving into. So I did.
Maria Cecilia Saba 8:16
I was thinking a lot about what the best lens would be to study these kinds of films because it didn鈥檛 feel like traditional Western theories or traditional structural film analysis might really do the films justice or be the best lens to look at the films, because a lot of these filmmakers were themselves self taught. I don鈥檛 know, it felt like there was more to these horror films produced in Ayacucho to just being entertainment. It kind of felt like they were testimonies. So that鈥檚 what got me into horror.
Rachel Wong 9:00
Yeah, and what I find so fascinating about too is, like you said, instead of it being purely for entertainment鈥檚 sake or for the sake of maybe it鈥檚 just a genre that鈥檚 very popular regardless of the market, there鈥檚 actually something deeper that makes it a little more than just purely something that you鈥檒l watch passively or just consume, almost.
Maria Cecilia Saba 9:23
And that鈥檚 the thing, you know? It鈥檚 interesting that you mention that, passively. Because I really don鈥檛 think that we consume films passively, I feel like the film spectator, if they are engaged with the story, if they are engaged with what they鈥檙e watching, it鈥檚 anything but passive. There鈥檚 a lot going on inside, in your body, while you鈥檙e watching a film. You react unconsciously, not deliberately. You react to whatever stimuli is being projected on the screen and whatever stimuli you鈥檙e hearing from the speakers. There鈥檚 something about horror, specifically, that I feel is very linked to social trauma and historic trauma. There鈥檚 been a lot of essays and studies conducted on this, it鈥檚 not coincidental that when a country has been through a war or something that has shaken society, a lot of horror films have been produced with monsters that kind of represent those fears.
Maria Cecilia Saba 10:22
We were talking before about the zombie films, for example, and how if you see when the zombie films start appearing on American screens, it kind of coincides a little bit with the time when the soldiers and the veterans were coming back from war, whether it was the Second World War or the Vietnam War. There鈥檚 even one film - for me it was very illustrative of this - which was "", I don鈥檛 know if you鈥檝e ever heard of this film. There鈥檚 two versions, right. So one is in the 70s, I think, that鈥檚 kind of like, shot in a more cinema verite kind of way. And the story of 鈥淭he Hills Have Eyes鈥� is about this family of mutants that live in some kind of desert outside, like if you took a detour from the highway, you arrive into this kind of forgotten village with mutants inhabiting the village. So the film was kind of launched after there was this huge reveal of the nuclear bomb testing that had been conducted in the deserts of the US. There was fear that maybe they had not evacuated properly the area, and these were actual social fears! You would see people talking about this in the news and things like that.
Maria Cecilia Saba 11:44
So of course a horror film appears when you have the consequences of what could have happened if they had not evacuated correctly the area, right? And you would find that throughout many countries and many cultures: The monster always represents the repressed and what we fear. And you always have what is normal and then the monster, whatever is repressed, breaks through and alters normality. It takes you to a state where everything is possible, where normal no longer is. So it鈥檚 also a little cathartic, it also allows you to experience that catastrophic reality, that manifestation of what is the realization of your worst fear, but from a safe distance as well.
Rachel Wong 12:31
Like without having to actually endure it, like you鈥檙e only enduring it through a screen.
Maria Cecilia Saba 12:37
But what is interesting about these films in Ayacucho is that everyone involved in the films actually endured the films, right? So we鈥檙e talking about a different kind of process here. It鈥檚 not a projection of what could happen or a projection of what is maybe about to happen in the short run, but it鈥檚 actually a bit of a testimony, of remembrance, a reworking of embodied memories, of the embodied fear, and I think that that is something that you can really see in the choice of frames. How you frame a shot, how long you hold that shot, as well. You know, what constitutes horror? It鈥檚 not necessarily a horrific monster built on CGI or on a lot of VFX or something that is very horrific to the view, or frightening to the view, but I think that horror, in many of these films, also lies in the narrative and in imagining being there in the moment.
Rachel Wong 13:40
What that makes me think of is when you hold a shot for so long, you have that experience of suspense and worry and anxiety. Looking at the title of your paper - which I have, very handily right here - and it鈥檚 called 鈥淎ltered Realities: Visceral Journeys into Post-War Peruvian-Andean Horror Films鈥�. So I guess if you don鈥檛 mind maybe breaking down - we鈥檝e talked a little bit about this already - but to break down a visceral journey, what do you mean by that?
Maria Cecilia Saba 14:09
I don鈥檛 think that the viewer is a passive viewer, so I feel that films and cinema takes you on a journey. It鈥檚 taking you on the universe of the film, of the story. You鈥檙e being touched as well, kind of sensorially, by whatever is in this universe of the film. For example, in one of the films, the universe is a very remote village that is very dark at night. So your journey in this film in particular is not knowing what is outside of the frame. Your journey is, you鈥檙e traveling along with the characters in this very deserted, very claustrophobic environment. And it鈥檚 visceral because I feel like you feel it in your gut. The stimuli there are, for me at least, are so sensorial, and I feel that your body responds so intensely to what you鈥檙e seeing on screen, to the faces, to the sounds, to the crying, to the atmosphere that is created that you鈥檙e really having this sort of visceral journey. You鈥檙e not the same person at the end of the film that you are at the start of the film.
Rachel Wong 15:27
And I鈥檓 interested to know because you were mentioning earlier how horror films and, correct me if I鈥檓 wrong, you had mentioned that they are not your cup of tea. So in terms of having this visceral reaction where you鈥檙e not just watching to scare yourself but you鈥檙e doing research, and I think that it鈥檚 a very smart way to go about this kind of research and like you said, maybe the traditional theories of how you would do content analysis for example that might not cut it, and it might not do these films justice. So it鈥檚 a different way of researching and it鈥檚 a different way of experiencing these films from an academic standpoint but also really engaging all of your senses and really paying attention to the characters and the storyline, the atmosphere. And I鈥檓 curious to know how that you impacted you as a person afterwards. Having to watch the two films that you mention in this paper, you probably did a whole group of viewings of other views. So all of that must impact you in a certain way, and I鈥檓 just wondering how you feel that watching these, doing this research, has impacted you.
Maria Cecilia Saba 16:35
It made me aware of my body, which is something I don鈥檛 think that we all do that enough. Like when we watch TV or films or anything, I don鈥檛 think we鈥檙e always aware of how our body is being triggered by what鈥檚 on screen and what you鈥檙e hearing. I mean it鈥檚 happening, but we don鈥檛 always listen to it. So I realize that, after watching the films, now every time I watch the film I can feel that. So it鈥檚 made me more sensitive to the aesthetics of the film, for example. For any film, it doesn鈥檛 have to be horror - horror, of course, is the one that鈥檚 easier to get excited or triggered with because it鈥檚 an assault on your senses. The whole theme of horror is to kind of shake you on with a story and give you this discharge of adrenaline. And you can feel that with any film, because you can feel that when you have a close up image of someone experiencing a strong emotion. I don鈥檛 know if you ever noticed if you鈥檙e watching a close up shot of someone鈥檚 face as they are breaking down into tears and they鈥檙e in a lot of pain or angst or whatever, then you start feeling like your eyebrows are lifting in the middle. Maybe you鈥檙e mouth is twitching a little bit, and that鈥檚 all very natural responses - we鈥檙e wired that way! We鈥檙e wired to mimic each other鈥檚 features, it鈥檚 part of our being in the world. So you can feel it that way.
Maria Cecilia Saba 18:14
Actually, one of my favourite scenes of an Andean horror films, it鈥檚 of the movie , one of the ones I analyzed in the essay, it鈥檚 this very long sequence with two of the characters who are, again, lost in the mountains in the middle of the night with no light. And when I say no light, I mean no light, because they didn鈥檛 even have any light to shoot! They鈥檙e using all of the resources they have in a very creative way. So they鈥檙e lighting the faces with actual fire lamps. What they had at the moment is what you get on screen, so you get a little bit of the faces lit up, and maybe you get a little bit of light simulating moonlight, but that鈥檚 about it. So it鈥檚 a very oppressive atmosphere. So this sequence has these two characters, one of them is looking for the monster - he wants to confront the monster. And the other character, the wife, is looking for the husband. So you can see that they are both in panic, they鈥檙e both super scared, there鈥檚 a lot of really close up shots of their faces as they look lost into the out of frame. So you go between both characters, between both shots, and the shots start kind of merging one into the other a little bit. Dissolving one into the other. You can see on the face of the wife, the desperation of the wife as she鈥檚 calling out her husband鈥檚 name in the middle of nowhere, and you can see here - I鈥檓 starting to feel it right now, in my body, as I鈥檓 telling you. You can see here with her face, she鈥檚 about to burst into tears because she鈥檚 so afraid. It鈥檚 those kinds of shots that evoke that kind of visceral reactions because it鈥檚 not only in your belly - you don鈥檛 only feel it in the knot like something is going to happen here, but you also feel it throughout.
Rachel Wong 20:13
I guess speaking of the film that you were referencing, how did you come to choose the two films that you analyzed for this piece? And you鈥檒l notice that I鈥檓 being very vague, I don鈥檛 want to botch the name or the pronunciation for our audience! But how did you come to choose these particular films over maybe other ones?
Maria Cecilia Saba 20:34
Again, I was in contact with Emilio back and forth while I was here doing my Master鈥檚 degree, right? And I told him that I was really interested in horror films and I asked him what were the ones that he would recommend, there were so many! And specifically I am most interested in those in Ayacucho but I鈥檓 open to other provinces as well. He started recommending some of the films, and some of the films I was able to watch online, someone had already downloaded it and posted it to YouTube, and others he very generously copied for me and sent me a link so that I could watch them here, and others he just, when I went to Lima, he gave me some copies. So I must have watched maybe 12 films, and that鈥檚 not a lot. It鈥檚 a very selected sample. And when I was talking to Laura [Marks] as well about my research, she gave me the idea of doing a showing of the films, so she encouraged me to plan this Andean horror film fest, which I did as part of my work in the Masters.
Maria Cecilia Saba 21:52
So then the thing became not only what films I was going to study, research on paper, but if I have the opportunity of selecting a few films to show to a non-Peruvian audience and show them what is Andean horror, what films would I choose? So I started narrowing down the films that I liked, the ones that spoke to me the most, or the ones that I thought had the most depth in a way, so I ended up settling between 3 or 4 films that I liked the most. And what鈥檚 common to all of the films was that not only were they horror films, but they were also adaptations of oral myths. So it wasn鈥檛 - I know that we鈥檝e talked about how these films resonate with internal armed conflict and the violence and the civil war and all that - they don鈥檛 talk about it explicitly, you know? So it鈥檚 not a horror film about war, they are not horror films about what was going on in Ayacucho at the time. They are adaptations of horror legends, of monsters, and Andean monsters.
Maria Cecilia Saba 23:12
So you have the Jarjacha, which is a were-llama-demon, so it鈥檚 a half man, half llama that gets turned into this being as a punishment for being incestuous. And these creatures, they inhabit a community, and their curse is that they look like people during the day, but their curse is to transform into a were-llama, and they go around attacking villagers at night and eating their brains and what not. So there鈥檚 a lot of syncretism into what the Jarjacha is because it kind of feels like it鈥檚 very unique and particular to Andean cosmology, but it has traits that you could associate with a werewolf or that you could associate with a vampire or whatever. The interesting thing about the jarjacha as well is that you cannot stop the jarjacha alone, you can only stop the jarjacha as a community. So it has to be punished by the community at sunrise, so there鈥檚 a lot of protocols for how you handle the jarjacha, and it鈥檚 very important that it鈥檚 a creature that is born inside of the community. So keep that in mind, because I will explain why it鈥檚 important.
Maria Cecilia Saba 24:33
Then you have the . That鈥檚 another creature and it鈥檚 another one of the monsters of the films. And the pishtaco is a whole kind of evil, right? The pishtaco is a foreign assassin. He鈥檚 usually white or has fairer skin, and what the pishtaco does is that it will kill peasants, like Andean people, to withdraw their fat, like extract their body fat, and sell it. So what鈥檚 interesting about the pishtaco is that it is a pre-Colombian legend. In pre-Colombian times, like before the conquest, the pishtacos were supposed to be the assassins, the elite assassins of the Inca. With the conquest, the pishtacos were said to be sent by the priests in the Catholic Church and they said that they would use the human fat to grease the bells at the churches so that the sound would travel further. And with Industrialization, they said that the pishtaco was actually working with the capitalist powers of North America and Europe and that they were using the fat to sell it to industrialized countries to oil their machines to increase production. And now they say that they use the fat to create cosmetics.
Maria Cecilia Saba 26:09
So it always changes - like what the pishtaco uses the fat for always changes, or who he sells it to - but it always a monster that represents extraction of natural resources. And it鈥檚 always foreign, so that鈥檚 always interesting as well. And then you have other creatures as well. You have the uma, it鈥檚 a witch that has a head that detaches from her body at night, and flies above the villages. And then you have the careceri, which is an evil shaman that will do pacts and what not, and there鈥檚 a whole universe of Andean creatures.
Maria Cecilia Saba 26:48
But the one that I researched, for example, were the pishtaco and the jarjacha, and the reason why I focused on these two is because their stories kind of felt like they represented a little bit of how the internal armed conflict was felt in Ayacucho. So this conflict there were three parties at war, really. You had the terrorist group, that was the . You had the Peruvian army, on the other side. And then you had the , that were like civilians that gathered together in these self-defense committees. Taking in mind these three players and taking in mind how it was felt in Ayacucho, it was differently felt in the northern part of Ayacucho and in the southern part of Ayacucho. So in the south, Shining Path was able to enter into the community in a more silent way. They integrated the community, and they ended up being very, very violent with the Andean population, like 70-something percent of the people who died during the conflict were peasants, over 50 had quechua or another Indigenous language as their first language. So it was very, very much based. Their activity was based in remote Andean communities. So in the south, they were integrated in the south and it was only later when they started revealing themselves as the terrorists, as Shining Path.
Maria Cecilia Saba 28:15
The way that Ayacuchanos will speak, or would speak, about senderistas at the time was sometimes by referring to them as jarjachas, you see? Because they were bred in the community, they were a part of the community, but they were actually killing each other. And this kind of, I think, also created a little bit of a safer distance to kind of speak of what was currently happening in the code of a legend, in the code of a popular cultural reference. And then the opposite happened in the north. Like in the north, the senderistas arrived much later, and they were more violent. So the Ayacuchanos from the northern communities, they did not let the senderistas in as easily as they did in the south. So they were attacked kind of like as an enemy way earlier, and when the military arrived, they were so vicious, so violent as well in the way that they were confronting the senderistas, that northern populations kind of felt like they were trapped between the two! They were trapped between the senderistas who wanted to coerce them into joining their army, and the military who thought that everyone was a senderista because they couldn鈥檛 tell who was. So that鈥檚 how they created these self-defense committees. So in the north, it鈥檚 interesting because then the assassin, the threat, is a foreign person. It鈥檚 not someone who was inbred in the community, and they ended up referring to pishtacos - they ended up referring to the army or the senderistas, anyone who looked a little different from the ones in the community, they were referred to as pishtacos.
Maria Cecilia Saba 30:01
So in the films for example, you see the way they have treated the jarjacha and the pishtaco and the way their stories have been treated, you can feel that they are recreating a little bit of the tension that was felt at the time of the conflict through an adaptation of a horror legend in the code of a horror film. So it鈥檚 very layered. It鈥檚 not just a horror film for entertainment, it鈥檚 actually like a testimony. I feel like there鈥檚 a lot of embodied memory involved there, you know. The actors of the films, they鈥檙e not professional actors. They鈥檙e natural actors. They haven鈥檛 studied a method, they are acting from memory, they are acting from experience. They鈥檙e bringing back a lot of what they have lived through and expressing it on camera. And I remember going to Ayacucho after I did the paper, and I went to Ayacucho and I started kind of - and I met with a lot of the filmmakers here. I asked them 鈥渨ere you here when the violence started in Ayacucho? Did you live through it? How did it influence your film?鈥� All of them said that they had been through the violence, like whatever was in their films is nowhere near the horror experienced or witnessed, so they said for them it鈥檚 kind of inevitable for them. That鈥檚 what they said. They don鈥檛 need to read a book, they don鈥檛 need to kind of learn what happened, because they have lived what happened. And it鈥檚 not like they鈥檙e doing the films thinking this is what I need to do in order to express what happened actually during the conflict. It鈥檚 the way they treat horror narratives, it鈥檚 already a bit infused with the experience, the memory of the experience of what happened.
Maria Cecilia Saba 31:54
And there鈥檚 filmmakers like , he鈥檚 the director of Jarjacha, he passed away last year. But he dedicated his whole film career to talking about the conflict. The guy has three films that are kind of in the melodrama genre that speak of the aftermath of the conflict, the social aftermath. Then he has three films that speak of the jarjacha, that are about the jarjacha and they are horror films, and then he has three other films that came out later that in the drama, social-realism drama that speak about the actual violence. And he does that starting from his own experience because he received death threats from Sendero, he was also tortured by the military, you know? He鈥檚 been through it all, and he felt like he was morally obliged to tell what happened because it鈥檚 not going to be the same, the testimony of someone from Ayacucho and has lived through it, as the testimony or whatever of someone from Lima who鈥檚 imagining what happened because they鈥檝e read it in a book or a study or whatever. There鈥檚 this need, still, in Ayacucho or other parts that have been hit or suffering with some trauma or crisis to release this story, to kind of tell the story and put it on screen. And there鈥檚 also a huge attendance for these films in Ayacucho, and you would think that maybe, if you鈥檝e been through all of that, why would you go see the film? But it鈥檚 also that release.
Maria Cecilia Saba 33:30
It鈥檚 not dealing with the trauma directly, not reliving it, but seeing it playing out in front of you at a safer distance and in the code of a fiction film. So I think there鈥檚 a lot of healing that is being done through these films - not only the horror films, I feel that the horror films are kind of like, the more shocking. The horror films will be the most triggering, for sure, also because they are talking about mythological monsters and creatures that don鈥檛 exist and all of that. Maybe those can be assimilated as fictions, because they are fictions, a little safer?
Rachel Wong 34:18
It definitely is. And there鈥檚 so much to take in, and I think one thing I got from that and I think I鈥檓 starting to understand is that its an opportunity, like you said, to go on this visceral journey to become more aware of yourself and to have that release and process your trauma in a different way/ one thing I鈥檓 curious about too was, you know, maybe for North American audiences who didn鈥檛 go through such a thing, so you were mentioning earlier you did hold a screening. I鈥檓 curious to know what the reception of Canadian audiences, people who were at that screening, what their response was to these films.
Maria Cecilia Saba 34:58
Put yourself in my place, I鈥檓 screening Peruvian-Andean horror films, that鈥檚 super niche! So I thought that I would only get very niche audiences, maybe someone who was really into horror films or maybe someone who was Peruvian or Latin American. But when Canadian audiences started showing up - and no lie, I actually invited a lot of them from the school, from 丁香园AV! But the fact is that they showed up, right? And because I knew some of them, I had seen them around, maybe they were not in my cohort but maybe we met before, and I was like 鈥淐an I interview you afterward, to find out a little more about how that impacted you? The feedback that I got was one, it was a thriller. It felt like a thriller. Some people said that the Jarjacha, was one of the best horror films, like indie horror films that they had seen. Other feedback that I got was, and I really liked this one, was someone said, 鈥淚鈥檝e never heard someone scream like that in my life.鈥� And they said that there was something very real about the scream and the agony that was being expressed by the actor. I always did a Q&A after every screening because of course it鈥檚 a lot to ask from audiences who had never heard of it. And to be fair, a lot of people in Lima had not heard of Andean horror films until recently. It's something very obscure, very cult.
Maria Cecilia Saba 36:34
So I would introduce them a little bit, explain a little bit of the production, the production value, that this is not going to be a Hollywood film so don鈥檛 expect huge visual effects and what not. And there鈥檚 going to be glitches, sure, because these were films that were made in year 2003, you know, with handycams sometimes, with very, very...it鈥檚 not high end cameras. These are video cameras that you could have at home with very small crews. So just setting the expectations where they should be. It鈥檚 a great film but it鈥檚 not Hollywood. And I would let them know a little bit of the context, but not too much - I didn鈥檛 want to give out too much before they saw the film because I wanted to see if they would get scared just with the film alone or what their reaction be just with the film alone. And afterward, I would try to bring the director on Skype - I succeeded with one of the directors - but otherwise, I had already interviewed them so mag times that I - not that I could speak for them, but I kind of like, led a bit of the discussion and contextualized a little more, talking a little bit about the sociopolitical context - everything that we talked about just now! And apparently that helped after they had experienced the film, tie the knots a little more. They would get a little more of the context.
Maria Cecilia Saba 38:13
And memory is a funny thing, memory is not static, right? So whenever you remember something, you鈥檙e remembering but actually it鈥檚 also kind of like re-remembering, re-living, and re-adjusting that memory to what you know in the present. Some of them I could see that they were like 鈥淥h, I get why this happened, oh I see it.鈥� So for some of them, when I talk to them afterwards, knowing the context afterward also kind of makes it more scary in retrospect. I think it was a good reception of the films, I think it鈥檚 not - definitely it鈥檚 not for everyone. You need to know what you鈥檙e going into. Like with a lot of films, you鈥檙e not gonna go see a film at the Cineplex and expect it to be filled with the same audiences that鈥檚 gonna go see Avengers, right? Every film has its audience. But yeah, I feel like the themes that are explored in these films are so humane and are so integrated to our human experience - loss or fear or anxiety or horror, terror - they are very basic human emotions, so I feel like it鈥檚 relatable, independent of where you鈥檙e coming from. If you have just a little bit of context, you can make more of it, but you will still understand the message and I think you鈥檒l still be moved by it.
Rachel Wong 39:40
Wow, oh my gosh. So it helps me to look at films, and even horror films - like I said something that I鈥檓 not really too fond of - but it makes me appreciate them a little more, so I thank you for that. And I think just to close, I鈥檓 curious to know, what, of all the ones you may have seen, what is your favourite horror film?
Maria Cecilia Saba 40:03
It鈥檚 the Jarjacha. (laughs)
Rachel Wong 40:05
You heard it here first!
Maria Cecilia Saba 40:08
Yeah, for me that鈥檚 my favourite, which is super unfair to all the other films because they鈥檙e all so good. But for me, the thing that really stuck with me from that film was the atmosphere: the oppressive darkness of the Andean night. Just that already feels kind of scary because you don鈥檛 know what鈥檚 out there, but also the framing of the faces and the length of the shots, just the entrainment. Of feeling like you鈥檙e there with them, you cannot look elsewhere like you鈥檙e focused on how they are experiencing that moment. So for me that treatment, that鈥檚 why it鈥檚 my favourite.
Rachel Wong 40:55
Well thank you so much Maria!
Maria Cecilia Saba 40:56
Thank you for talking with me.
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Rachel Wong 41:04
Thanks again to Maria Cecilia Saba for joining us on this week鈥檚 episode of Below the Radar. And as well, many thanks to the great people who help to put this podcast together, including myself, Rachel Wong, Paige Smith, and Fiorella Pinillos. Davis Steele is the composer of our theme music, and thanks to you for listening. We鈥檒l catch you next time on Below the Radar.
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