Neruda * * *

     Having demonstrated my ignorance of India and Pakistan (see below) I shall now move on to Chile.

     I don’t know if  this ambitious film succeeds or fails. Maybe your enjoyment of it will depend on how much you know beforehand - like what happened in Chile in the 1940’s - especially in regard to the Communist Senator Pablo Neruda who was also a famous poet.  I didn't know anything about him.

Neruda considers the incompetency
of a proletariat film reviewer.

      Although it venerates Pablo Neruda, at the same time the film doesn’t mind showing the indulged and privileged life he enjoyed with his intellectual left wing friends whilst supposedly being a champion of the poor and oppressed. There are a few amusing scenes where he is called out on that.

     Sometimes Neruda struck me as being a satire.  But that might have been because the actual situation was absurd.  The Communist party had been banned overnight and a warrant was put out for the arrest of Neruda.  One policeman in particular was given the task of tracking him down and executing him.  At the same time, the Government didn’t really want Neruda caught as his death would cause an outrage.

       So, with the assigned policeman narrating the story we have a cat and mouse game across Chile.

The poems of Neruda are frequently quoted and we are given a twist where we can’t even be sure if the policeman exists.

      Part political drama, part satire, part comedy, and very poetic, Neruda has a dreamlike quality, heightened by situations that are almost surreal.  Perhaps for those familiar with the story the combination would be perfect.  But for me it caused Neruda to come across as rather insular and distant.  Watching this  I felt like I was at a party where I didn’t know anyone and no one was taking the time to bring me into the circle. Perhaps, like the South American left wing intellectuals it features, that was the idea.

     It is directed by Pablo Larrain who also directed Jackie, a film which greatly impressed me. That too had a dreamlike, almost surreal, quality to it, but in that case I thought it highly appropriate.    

       So now I have to ask myself, would I have been impressed by Jackie if I hadn’t known the story - and would I be more impressed by Neruda if I was familiar with the legend of Pablo Neruda?  I’ll give it the benefit of the doubt.