[R-G] Chavez's homegrown film studio mixes politics and art in Venezuela

[Anthony Fenton]

Copyright 2007 Associated Press
All Rights Reserved
Associated Press Worldstream

September 25, 2007 Tuesday 1:13 PM GMT

SECTION: INTERNATIONAL NEWS

LENGTH: 1023 words

HEADLINE: Chavez's homegrown film studio mixes politics and art in  
Venezuela

BYLINE: By FABIOLA SANCHEZ, Associated Press Writer

DATELINE: GUARENAS Venezuela

BODY:


Lights! Camera! Revolution!

Unhappy with what he considers Hollywood's monopoly on the silver  
screen, President Hugo Chavez is bankrolling Venezuelan movies  
through a state-run film studio. Now rolling: a biopic about Luis  
Posada Carriles, the former CIA operative who lives freely in the  
United States despite allegedly masterminding a jetliner bombing and  
trying to kill Fidel Castro.

Scenes are being shot in and around Caracas this month for the movie  
about Posada, considered by Chavez to be a Latin American version of  
Osama bin Laden. Due for international release next year, it is one  
of a growing number of films the socialist government is funding in a  
fusion of politics and art.

The trend is a boost to homegrown cinema in Venezuela, but critics  
say it reeks of Soviet-style propaganda efforts.

Chavez has long demanded that the United States extradite Posada to  
stand trial in the 1976 Cuban jetliner bombing, which killed 73  
people. Posada allegedly masterminded the attack while living in  
Venezuela, where he was a member of a secret police force dedicated  
to rooting out Marxist rebels.

"The film argues he should be condemned and returned here to  
Venezuela or to Cuba to be tried for his actions," director Eduardo  
Barberena told The Associated Press during one recent filming session.

Cameras rolled last week among the wooden shacks of a modern-day  
shantytown in Guarenas, near the film studio east of Caracas. An  
actor playing a communist rebel in 1970s Venezuela rode a bicycle  
down a dirt road, destined for a shootout with Posada, as lights  
illuminated a row of shacks where barefooted children stood watching.

The US$900,000 (euro640,000) movie is one of several being produced  
by the Cinema Villa studio, which Chavez founded last year with US$13  
million (euro9.2 million) in government funding as an alternative to  
the "dictatorship of Hollywood."

The studio's first feature film will be released next month a movie  
about Venezuelan independence hero Francisco de Miranda that includes  
American actor Danny Glover in a supporting role.

A third production in the works is about Ezequiel Zamora, who led a  
19th century land revolt in Venezuela and is a key ideological figure  
for Chavez.

"Venezuelan cinema for the world," Chavez exclaimed, praising what he  
called a "cultural revolution" as he excitedly described the films  
during his radio and TV program Sunday and criticized the global  
influence of U.S. films. "They make us admire Superman, Spider-Man,"  
Chavez said.

"Spider-Man 3" was a hit in Caracas, both in theaters and through  
pirated DVDs sold in the streets, and most Venezuelans, like people  
all over the world, continue to be big Hollywood fans. But left- 
leaning documentaries are already altering Venezuelan television,  
appearing on government-supported channels alongside the traditional  
soap operas of commercial channels.

And Barberena, who has mostly made TV commercials, sees Cinema Villa  
as a chance for Venezuela to expand a tiny movie industry which has  
made only a few internationally known movies, such as "El Pez que  
Fuma" (The Smoking Fish) in 1977 and "Secuestro Express" (Express  
Kidnapping) in 2005.

Three dozen feature films, documentaries and television programs are  
now in production at the center, according to Culture Minister  
Francisco Sesto. They include "Imagining Revolution," about the  
development of Chavez's socialist movement, and "Venezuela Petroleum  
Company," about corporate exploitation.

The new film center is both financed and controlled by the  
government, similar to how Cuba runs its Institute of Cinematographic  
Art and Industry. Scripts are selected by a committee that includes  
Venezuela's culture minister, who reports directly to Chavez.

Cinema Villa director Lorena Almarza said the goal of the state film  
center is nothing less than the "transformation of the cultural  
hegemony" that has long bombarded Venezuelans through their  
televisions and movie screens.

Some critics see a heavy government hand that will result in lousy art.

Communications professor Antonio Pascuali of Venezuela's Central  
University accuses the Cinema Villa of "putting political slogans  
above the quality of their productions," just as the Soviet Union did  
in the Stalinist years.

But Barbarena denies getting any pressure to make his movie conform  
to Chavez's political views. Although the thriller takes a clear  
stance on Posada, the script "allows a bit of freedom for him to  
defend himself," the director said.

Posada, 79, denies involvement in the 1976 jetliner bombing off  
Barbados. He escaped from a Venezuelan prison in 1985 and was  
detained in Florida in 2005 for entering the U.S. illegally, but was  
freed in May when a judge dismissed his immigration fraud case. The  
Cuban and Venezuelan governments want him tried for murder and  
treason in Venezuela, where he holds dual citizenship.

But a U.S. immigration judge ruled in 2005 that he could not be  
deported to Venezuela, saying he faces a possibility of torture.

Posada, who trained with the CIA for the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion,  
also allegedly plotted to assassinate Castro, and allegedly planned  
the 1997 bombings at tourists sites in Havana.

Barbarena says filming will move to Havana later this year to  
recreate the 1997 bombing of the Hotel Copacabana, which killed an  
Italian tourist. The movie's title, "Bambi C-4," combines the  
explosive allegedly used by Posada and the nickname he used years ago  
in Venezuela.

Despite a dislike for some Hollywood movies, Chavez has enjoyed  
visits by sympathetic American stars including Glover and Sean Penn.  
Kevin Spacey met Chavez on Monday night after touring the film  
studio. He didn't speak to reporters but according to state media was  
impressed by the Cinema Villa.

After Chavez's government recently offered US$18 million (euro12.7  
million) to finance "Toussaint," a film directed by Glover about  
Haitian independence leader Toussaint Louverture, Venezuela's two  
independent film organizations said the money could be better spent  
making more Venezuelan movies.

Chavez insists Venezuela will be doing plenty of that "making movies  
about our reality, which reflect who we are, what we've been."