Eisenstein in Guanajuato

NARRATOR:
In 1931, the Russian

film director Sergei Eisenstein

travelled to Mexico to make a film.

It was tentatively to be called

iQue viva Mexico!

Eisenstein had a worldwide fame

based on the reputation of only three films,

all made in Soviet Russia.

Strike, a violent tale of civilian unrest

viciously crushed by authority,

The Battleship Potemkin, a violent account

of a naval mutiny over rotten meat,

and October, a violent celebration

of the Russian Revolution.

(GLASS SHATTERING)

In the West, the film October

was called Ten Days That Shook The World.

(FLIES BUZZING)

This present film might be called

Ten Days That Shook Eisenstein.

(FLY BUZZING)

(CLASSICAL MUSIC)

(FLY BUZZING)

I arrive accompanied by flies.

They have been with me ever since

I crossed the Mexican border.

I brought them with me from Moscow.

(FLY BUZZING)

I recognise them.

They are Soviet flies, spy flies...

Russian accents,

a growling, gruff, ill-mannered buzz.

They have bloodshot eyes, like me.

Do I have bloodshot eyes?

Do I have bloodshot eyes?

Do I have bloodshot eyes?

Do I have bloodshot eyes?

Of too much looking. Too much...

Too much looking.

- Diego.

- Sergei, my friend!

- You're welcome.

- Grazie.

- Frida.

- Sergei.

- Bienvenido.

- Encantado.

Jorge Palomino Caedo.

Your Guanajuato guide.

Sergei Eisenstein.

Sometimes a Russian film director

or Russian film director retired.

Ah. This is Aleksandrov.

Always an actor.

- Frida.

- Grisha.

And this is Eduard Tisse, cameraman.

The cameraman.

- Frida.

- Tisse.

Please take the suitcases.

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen.

Hey, look.

(OMINOUS MUSIC)

(WHISTLING)

(ORCHESTRA PLAYING)

(EXHALES SHARPLY)

Put all the red books over there.

All the books with

the blue markers over there.

All English books by the bed.

All American books under the bed.

(SPEAKING SPANISH)

(SQUEAKING)

(AIR HISSING)

- Can I help?

- There is a trick, isn't there?

What am I doing wrong?

I expect nothing.

We don't have showers in Moscow.

In fact, we don't have showers in Russia.

Baths, Turkish baths.

And wash basins.

Sometimes we have running water.

Sometimes we have water.

Sometimes we have just the empty taps.

Sometimes we have to

break the ice in the tank.

Often...

We don't wash.

- (PALOMINO LAUGHING)

- What are you laughing about?

A Russian body. Very white.

We rarely see the Sun in Moscow,

and we never undress in public.

- Then I can't be public.

- Public enough.

That's his.

PALOMINO:
And a very well-fed body.

Pea-soup, pickled cabbage,

salty bacon, sour milk, turnips?

When we can get it.

See you at breakfast?

Tortillas, tamales, chicken burritos,

chimichangas, sopecitos,

huarachitos, pan de muerto...

Hey! Warm water?

Being naked in public?

Or a response to an amiable young man?

Signor Prick, behave!

He's handsome, it's true. (CHUCKLES)

And he's seen you, it's true.

But you are a foreigner

with a Russian passport,

a limited visitor's visa,

and very little sexual experience.

You would be woefully disadvantaged.

Besides, you are here to make a film with me,

and I need your frustrations

to feed my imagination.

No dissipation.

It leads to a dilution of energy.

(EXHALING RAPIDLY)

I am a boxer

for the freedom of cinematic expression.

I have never had my shoes shined for me.

We don't do those sorts of things

any more in Soviet Russia.

You're in Mxico.

Why don't you try it?

-( SPEAKING SPANISH)

- S.

(EXHALES DEEPLY)

(CHUCKLES)

I'm behaving like a colonial grandee.

Shining shoes is tantamount to kissing feet.

Who kisses feet any more?

Do I tip him heavily

to cover up my bourgeois guilt?

No.

If you tip him, news of your generosity

will be around the town in five minutes.

And your shoes will never be yours again.

They will be a host to fortune.

You have come here for something

other than shiny shoes.

What are you looking for?

I came to Mexico to make a movie.

I came to Mexico

because my very first

theatre production in Moscow

was called The Mexican.

I came to Mexico because

you had a successful revolution

five years before we did.

I came to Guanajuato

because you have here

a Museum Of The Dead.

Maybe I have to make a film

called Museum Of The Living.

Those are my excuses.

What are your excuses?

I live here. I have a family here.

I teach in Mexico City, and I teach here.

And what do you teach?

I studied as an anthropologist.

And now I teach comparative religion.

This is a Roman Catholic country.

How come you are allowed

to talk about other religions?

(SIGHS)

Roman Catholicism of Mxico

is generous and all-embracing.

Pantheistic.

A bit of everything. Old and new.

They just take what they need.

So much so, we should call it

Mexican Catholicism.

They customised it.

We have pre-Columbian equivalents

for everything

the Roman Catholics dreamed up.

Certainly, we invented

blood sacrifices before you did.

Christianity adopted us.

We did not adopt Christianity.

(BELL TOLLING)

It's Gideon. His name is Gideon.

He was born blind.

And the bells have made him deaf.

There is a problem.

They have been searching

through your books

and found pornography.

Are you a pornographer?

I didn't think so up till now.

One of the hotel maids arranging your books

has taken some photographs,

but she is underage.

Her mother found the photographs

and complained to the hotel.

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