More important than a movie

OSTENSIBLY A movie about recreating the exploits of Christopher Columbus, Even the Rain is about history and so much more. The film is dedicated to the memory of Howard Zinn, which is appropriate because the movie, like the late historian, sees history as not merely an exploration of the past, but also an attempt to better understand the present in order to shape the future.

The main players in Even the Rain are a Spanish film crew and the locals they hire to portray the indigenous people that Columbus encounters. The Spaniards producing the movie-within-the-movie believe they are doing everything right, depicting Columbus as a brute who crushed the Native Americans.

They even cast indigenous people and allow them to speak their native language, and yet find themselves exploiting these people, just as Columbus and his crew did 500 years earlier.

The trouble begins when the crew arrives to film on location, not in the Caribbean but in Cochabamba, Bolivia, in early 2000. The South American nation provides a vast supply of cheap, indigenous labor to cast as extras in the film, even though they are not the descendants of the people who met Columbus, nor is it the land that he explored. The lack of authenticity ends up being the least of their problems.

In a wonderful twist of irony, the actor playing Christopher Columbus is the one person among the Spaniards who understands what is happening. In a scene-stealing performance by Karra Elejalde, Antón is larger than life whether in character or out--at one moment as Columbus gloating about his exploits, and the next ridiculing his employers for their degrading treatment of the extras, not to mention the Bolivians who cater their meals.

He points out embarrassing aspects of the script, which puts forward the 16th century Catholic Bishop and historian Bartolomé de las Casas as the conscience of the film, while omitting the fact that Las Casas supported African slavery as an alternative to exploiting the indigenous population.

Unfortunately, Antón is just an old drunk with a big mouth and is hardly in a position to do anything more than make the other Spaniards squirm.

A YOUNG local man named Daniel (Juan Carlos Aduviri) is cast as the leader of the indigenous revolt against Columbus because of his fiery spirit, but it turns out that he is also active in protesting the Bolivian government's plans to privatize the water supply.

Sebastián, the director (Gael García Bernal), stumbles upon a small protest led by Daniel, who tells the crowd that the government wants to sell off everything, "even the rain," which Bolivians would no longer be allowed to collect once the water is controlled by a multinational conglomerate. This is a serious problem--not the water issue, which hardly affects the Spanish film crew, but Daniel's activities threaten to hold up production if he is beaten up or imprisoned by the police.

Eventually, Cochabamba explodes in protest against the privatization of the water, leading to a scene where the film crew is invited into the lavish headquarters of a Bolivian official while a full-scale class war erupts outside.

Antón is escorted away before he offends the official, while Sebastián has an opportunity to express his liberal conscience. "How can you ask people to pay for a 300 percent increase in their water bill when they survive on only $2 a day?" he asks.

"I hear that is also what you are paying your crew," the official responds. While this rational conversation between enlightened individuals occurs inside, the people of Cochabamba are taking action on the streets outside to stop their own exploitation.

The film crew eventually finds that their money can buy many things, including their own comfort and safety, but they are virtually powerless to affect the events around them. They are quite good at making their movie, but are utterly ineffective at intervening in Bolivian politics or even assuring the safety of their extras.

The real players in Cochabamba are the state and the local population and, unlike the victorious Conquistadors, these Spaniards can do little more than vacillate between the two warring camps. The tragic history of Spanish conquest of the Americas repeats itself, they discover, but this time as a farce.

Even the Rain is an exploration of history and how the enlightened may reflect on past injustices and yet be clueless when the same issues arise in contemporary politics. But even more, it looks at the ethics of filmmaking and asks how a for-profit enterprise can portray these events without exploiting those involved.

At one point, for example, a group of Bolivian women are asked to reenact a horrible event for the film, and they all refuse. They willingly strip down half-naked and pretend to be something they are not for a day's pay, but they cannot even imagine acting out certain scenarios. Sebastián asks Daniel to help convince them to participate, since it is all just an act, but even he cannot win them over. "Some things are more important than your film," he tells the director.

Later, Columbus' crew is filmed carrying out a gruesome slaughter, and it seems like at any moment, the Bolivians will break out of character and rise up against their oppressors, on screen and off. Sebastián, well aware of this tension, breathes a sigh of relief once this crucial scene is completed.

The ethical issues portrayed in Even the Rain are serious problems confronting filmmakers. Both Slumdog Millionaire and The Kite Runner, for example, hired local people from India and Afghanistan, respectively, only to find themselves under fire for the low wages paid to the actors.

Furthermore, it is highly problematic for Western filmmakers to portray people from developing countries acting out scenes they might otherwise consider too degrading if it were not for their measly paycheck and utter lack of other opportunities. Turning around and making a buck or two--or 100 million--off the movie simply makes the entire enterprise that much more unsavory.

SOME FILM critics, including Stephen Holden of the New York Times and Mick LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle have described the politics of Even the Rain as "heavy-handed," even though these two are among the critics who gave the film a positive review.

But let's not forget that this is a movie about the genocide of Native Americans and the exploitation of modern-day Bolivians. If the portrayal of the historical events in the movie seems heavy-handed, blame the events, not the movie.

LaSalle goes on to say that the water privatization scheme is:

outrageous, and yet, let's face it, who wants to watch a movie about poverty-stricken Bolivians screaming about their water bill? Realizing this, the filmmakers disguise their passion about water rights in a story that keeps viewers concerned about things like the casting of extras and the personalities of people on location...

[But the movie] force-feeds the audience on the notion of Daniel's nobility, when he's an often difficult man who is inconsiderate, disloyal and foolish in his choices. In truth, once the audience gets behind the notion of the Columbus film and starts hoping to see it realized, then everything that interrupts it--including and especially Daniel--becomes an obstacle to the audience's purpose...

LaSalle entirely misses the point while taking on the same condescending attitude as the producer of the Columbus film, who is annoyed by the Bolivians because they keep interrupting his valuable production time. The goal of the Bolivian extras is to stand up to injustice and humiliation, whether inflicted by the film crew or their own government.

For them, the film is just a paycheck--and a paltry one at that--and their real priority is to live with dignity in their "poverty-stricken" neighborhoods. Rather than being a distraction, the conflicting goals of the Columbus movie and the Bolivian revolt are the source of the film's dramatic tension and seeing the characters express their emotions as themselves and simultaneously as characters in the movie-within-the-movie is part of what makes Even the Rain so interesting.

Some of us, like Daniel, think that some things are more important than the completion of the movie. It is to the film's credit that it is about Columbus, the Bolivian water wars and the ethics of filmmaking all at the same time, with each topic commenting on the other.

If the movie has a weakness, it comes at the end, when one character has an abrupt change of heart to set up the climax. The character's sudden nobility is unconvincing as the movie falls into a traditional chase scene--if anything, it is these final scenes that are lacking as all the complexity and cleverness of the film are stripped down into a single heroic act.

In the meantime, however, Even the Rain is consistently engaging as it grapples with a number of different issues.

The movie deserves to be seen widely, but let's hope that Hollywood producers in particular take the time to watch it. Unfortunately, I suspect most of them would do no more than wring their hands before proceeding to make their next mindless blockbuster.

However, they might be more careful about hiring local extras, especially that hot-tempered guy who is perfect for the role of the angry rebel. He just might ruin everything.