Rebelde sin causa

Comentarios: victor_m@cimat.mx
"There was theatre (Griffith), poetry (Murnau), painting (Rossellini),
dance (Eisenstein), music (Renoir). Henceforward there is cinema. And
the cinema is Nicholas Ray."
- Jean-Luc Godard -

Rebelde Sin Causa es una película que siempre ha merecido mucha

atención, por varias razones. La primera de ellas está ligada a la
trascendencia innegable de su director, Nicholas Ray (Wisconsin, 1911
- New York, 1979), quien fuera capaz de desarrollar una obra
completamente personal e incluso experimental dentro de una industria
que, en los años de realización de sus películas, se caracterizaba por
explotar las convenciones de los géneros cinematográficos más
redituables (una muestra clara de esto es Johnny Guitar, un western
totalmente atípico de Ray, donde la trama gira alrededor de dos
mujeres, que tienen los roles duros del film). Está también por
supuesto, el hito generado por la película, que en su momento (como
varios críticos lo han hecho notar) creó una nueva forma de entender y
abordar los problemas juveniles de la época. Otra razón son sus
protagonistas, sobre todo James Dean, quien a raíz de esta película
(estrenada unos días después de su muerte) se convirtió en mito
instantáneo, el rebelde por antonomasia. Algo menos perceptible son
las connotaciones sexuales y sugerencias homosexuales presentes en la
película, que en su momento no resultó claro para el público, aunque
esto estuviera presente en otras obras de Ray, desde antes.
Rebelde Sin Causa es la historia de la alienación juvenil de una
época, representada en tres jóvenes de la clase media estadounidense.
Jim Stark (James Dean), Judy (Natalie Wood) y Plato (Sal Mineo), son
tres adolescentes que comparten la ausencia de una figura paterna que
los ayude a sobrellevar sus problemas. Desde las secuencias iniciales
vemos cómo sus vidas se cruzan al estar casualmente en una comisaria,
donde son llevados por razones similares.
Jim resiente la falta de determinación y coraje de su padre, que no
es capaz de controlar ni a su propia esposa. En una escena Jim les
dice a sus padres: "¡Me están desgarrando! Tu dices una cosa, él dice
otra, y después cambian." En otra, le dice al comisario refiriéndose a
sus padres: "Se lo comen vivo [a su padre] y él no dice una palabra.
No lo respetan en lo más mínimo."
Judy siente profundamente la ausencia de cariño. Dice respecto a su
padre: "Me odia. Me mira como si yo fuera el ser más horrible del
mundo". Esto la lleva a buscar el amor en otras personas.
Posteriormente en la película le dice a Jim: "Todo el tiempo he estado
buscado a alguien que me ame, y ahora yo amo a alguien. Es tan fácil".

Los padres de Plato están separados. Esto lo lleva a convertirse en

un ser introvertido, mitómano y a descargar su furia de diversos
modos. "Nadie puede ayudarme", le dice a un oficial en la comisaria.
De alguna manera ellos tres se complementan. Jim encuentra cierto
alivio al sentirse en compañia de Judy y Plato. Judy encuentra en él
el cariño faltante, y Plato encuentra en ellos dos la representación
de los padres que no tiene.
Finalmente, una tragedia ocurre en sus vidas, lo que les lleva (a
los que aún quedan) a encontrar algún consuelo para enfrentar una vida
adulta.
Una lectura superficial de la película es que la causa de los
problemas juveniles recae en una figura paterna, que requiere del
control y dominación de su familia (en especial de la madre) para
asegurar una convivencia feliz de sus hijos. Es decir, un macho. Sin
embargo, esto no es así.
Si bien, en palabras del propio Ray, Rebelde Sin Causa es la
historia de "la búsqueda del padre", de "la falla de proveer la imagen
adecuada del padre, ya sea en la fortaleza o autoridad", él va mucho
más allá. Hay detalles y sugerencias dentro de la película que rompen
nuevamente con el esquema típico del melodrama Hollywodense de la
época. Las connotaciones sexuales están presentes en toda la historia.
Es ahora notorio que Plato, el personaje de Sal Mineo siente una
atracción sexual hacia Jim, además de encontrar en él la figura
paterna. El mismo Mineo, años después declararía "ahora me doy cuenta
que representé el primer personaje gay en una película juvenil." Roger
Ebert, crítico de cine ha hecho notar que también hay una sugerencia
sexual en la relación de Judy y su padre. En una escena ella le da un
beso y él reacciona enojado. Le dice "las chicas de tu edad no hacen
eso." Ella responde: "¿las chicas no aman a sus padres? ¿desde cuándo?
¿desde que tengo 16?" y la implicación que hace Ebert es que el padre
tiene miedo de sus sentimientos de tipo sexual hacia su hija.
En una secuencia inolvidable, los estudiantes de la preparatoria,
entre ellos los protagonistas, visitan un observatorio. El tema que se
muestra ahí es "El fin del hombre". El narrador del observatorio dice
"Acabaremos como empezamos, convertidos en gas y fuego. La tierra no
será extrañada. En la inmensidad del espacio, los problemas del hombre
parecen triviales y tontos, y el hombre, un ser solitario, es un
episodio de pequeñas consecuencias."
Así pues, los problemas del hombre (y en consecuencia de los
jóvenes), la falta de cariño, de una figura paterna, el odio, la
incomprensión, la preferencia sexual reprimida, su soledad, parecen
carecer de importancia. Sin embargo, duelen y lastiman. Esto es
quizás, lo que la película intenta decir.

Rebelde sin causa (Rebel without a cause. EU, 1955)

Dirigida por Nicholas Ray
Escrita por Nicholas Ray e Irving Shulman
Con: James Dean (Jim Stark), Natalie Wood (Judy), Sal Mineo (John
"Plato" Crawford), Edward Platt (Ray Fremick).
Entrevistas con Alejandro Jodorowsky:

"I am not normal". The Guardian Interview by Steve Rose. Tomado de

http://film.guardian.co.uk/interview/interviewpages.

"I am not making hot dogs". Entrevista con Alejandro Jodorowsky

por Sam Mcabee & Forestter Cobalt. Tomado de http://www.5minutesonline.com

"I am not normal"

Alejandro Jodorowsky has made three cult films, writes esoteric sci-fi and
claims he will live to 150. Steve Rose met him

Friday November 22, 2002

The Guardian

Many film-makers have profited from the wild and vivid

imagination of Alejandro Jodorowsky, but Jodorowsky himself
is not one of them. He has made three classic cult movies -
El Topo, The Holy Mountain and Santa Sangre - and he has
had a significant influence on popular culture over the
past 35 years, from Mexican cinema to the making of Alien,
the imagery of Marilyn Manson and even the development of
mime. But he hasn't made a penny out of it.

A Chilean-born Jewish Russian, Jodorowsky has described his

films as the equivalent of psychedelic drugs. They mix
surrealism, mysticism and warped violence, and have
invariably been too esoteric, too pretentious or too
graphic for popular consumption. They are, however, filled
with unforgettable images: the conquest of Latin America
re-enacted by costumed frogs; a circus elephant's funeral,
complete with giant coffin; a master duellist whose weapon
is a butterfly net.

His film-making techniques were similarly unorthodox. He

regularly used non-actors he found on location, and there
are tales of him putting them, and himself, through
gruelling experiences for the camera. Rumour has it he
would make them drink one another's blood, film real
violence rather than staged and dangle himself off rickety
rope bridges in the desert. Allegedly, he even killed 300
rabbits with his bare hands for one scene.

Separating truth from fiction, or even the past from the

present, has always been a problem with a figure like
Jodorowsky. Today - silver-haired, smartly dressed and
surrounded by cats in his book-lined Paris apartment - he
looks every bit the senior artist. However, his contempt
for linear thought is undiminished.

"Listen," he says. "I can make this interview like a normal

person. I am not a normal person. I am living in a normal
body, but my mind is not normal. When you speak about my
past, I have no past. You see the person I am now - I am
74. My wife is 37 years younger than me. I don't feel the
difference. My consciousness is without limits more than
when I was 40 or 50. I don't regret any past. I am not
there. I am not sorry not to make pictures, because I know
one day I will do it. I intend to live 150 years. I am only
in the middle of my life. So when you say what do you think
about the past? Nothing! It's done!"

This much we do know. Having directed theatre in Chile and

studied mime in Paris with Marcel Marceau (for whom he
claims to have invented the famous "I'm trapped inside a
glass box" routine), Jodorowsky filmed his no-budget 1967
debut, Fando y Lis, from a half-remembered play by his
surrealist associate Fernando Arrabal. The film generated
censure and death threats in Mexico. But Jodorowsky didn't
come to international attention until two years later when
he released El Topo, in which he plays a black-clad
gunslinger in search of enlightenment.

The film was seen by John Lennon, who advised Apple manager
Allen Klein to buy the rights to it, and introduced the
first screening of it in New York. El Topo became a
permanent fixture of late-night hippie cinema for the rest
of the decade and a favourite of the emerging New Hollywood
generation, particularly the likes of Dennis Hopper and
Jack Nicholson. Hopper's ill-fated follow-up to Easy Rider,
The Last Movie, was inspired by Jodorowsky's spontaneous,
free-ranging methods, as well as his mystical and
anthropological concerns. At one stage, Hopper invited
Jodorowsky to his studio in Taos, New Mexico to help him
finish the movie.

"When I see the rushes - not very clear, but some beautiful
scenes," Jodorowsky remembers. "He had a lot of material
and six editing machines, but he could not do it. In one or
two days I cut it myself, but I think Dennis didn't want
another guy making his movie, so he rejected it and made
his own. It was not so good. Later I asked him to be in
Santa Sangre, and he said no, just like that."

Meanwhile, Lennon had persuaded Klein to put up $1m to help

Jodorowsky make another film, The Holy Mountain. Like El
Topo, it was a spiritual quest, this time following a
Christ-like figure (Jodorowsky, again) seeking immortality.
"El Topo was normal, The Holy Mountain was abnormal. My
ambition was enormous. I wanted to make a picture like you
would make a holy book, like the Bhagavad Gita or the Tao
Te Ching. I went very far."

Jodorowsky hired a fashionable guru to prepare him,

performing mystical exercises and experimenting with LSD
and magic mushrooms (the only time he has taken drugs, he
says). He put his cast through a similar process, keeping
them in a house together for two months and allowing them
only four hours' sleep a night. The result was even more
extravagant than El Topo, and although it was never shown
in the US, it became an underground hit in Europe.

Jodorowsky's next project was even more ambitious. Over-

ambitious, as it turned out: a $20m French-financed
adaptation of Frank Herbert's Dune. An impressive team was
assembled. Orson Welles agreed to take a role, as did
Salvador Dali, who recommended to Jodorowsky a Swiss
painter called HR Giger for concept designs. Also on the
team were Pink Floyd, French graphic artist Moebius and
writer Dan O'Bannon. After a year of preparation, the
project fell through. According to Jodorowsky, the
Hollywood producers realised they could make a similar
picture without a wild card like himself at the helm, and
pulled the plug. Jodorowsky's disregard for the sanctity of
Herbert's novel could also have been a factor.

A few years later, Hollywood was working on its own version

of Dune, with David Lynch directing. Meanwhile, Ridley
Scott made Alien with half the crew Jodorowsky had
assembled, including Giger as creature designer and
O'Bannon as writer. Jodorowsky was left behind. His one
triumphant return was Santa Sangre, made in 1990: a
customarily freakish but more accessible circus horror with
echoes of Tod Browning and Hitchcock's Psycho. There were
two more failed projects: an Indian elephant film, Tusk,
and an unreleased film, The Rainbow Thief, starring Peter
O'Toole ("I hated him; he was the worst person I ever met
in my life").

"When you don't do something, you shouldn't think of it as

a failure," says Jodorowsky. "Failure doesn't exist. It's
only a change of direction." Now he has turned to the
medium of comic books, where his imagination can run riot
without budgetary constraints. He has several titles on the
go, including an epic sci-fi series, Incal, with Moebius,
and its offshoot, Metabarons, a sort of delirious, space-
age Greek tragedy.
There are plans for a $15m sequel to El Topo, in which
Jodorowsky's friend and fan, Marilyn Manson, is expected to
star. But raising capital is difficult for Jodorowsky, and
he has no expectations.

Nor does he have any bitterness, he says, towards those who

have made money from his ideas. "It's not important. What's
important is to give your ideas to the world if you love
the world. My pictures are a gift. I am an honest artist.

"For me, the goal of art is to heal. I see avant-garde art

now - it is all destructive. But I think to be avant-garde,
you need to be a saint. That's why I push my art into
therapy. I help people. In the last six months, three young
people who were going to commit suicide have told me I
saved their lives. That is better than making films."

I Am Not Making Hot Dogs

An Interview wit Alejandro Jodorowsky
(director El Topo, Holy Mountain, Santa Sangre)
Sam Mcabee & Forestter Cobalt

Sam: Okay, the first thing that I wanted to ask you about was, where do
you think inspiration comes from? Where do your ideas come from?

Inspiration comes from imagination. And what is imagination? We don't know. Eh?
Is coming from unconscious. That is the truth.

Do you think that ideas become more prominent when, let's say, there's a
collective of people, or do you think that ideas are easier to come to when
you're alone?

The concept of "easy" or "difficult" doesn't exist in the human soul. It's like a flower.
A flower open without difficulty. It's not easy, it's not difficult, the flower opens. The
artistic creation is like this: like the flowers. You wait, and then the idea open.
[Gestures with his hand like a flower opening.] Like this, no? You don't construct
what you do. What you do is born into yourself. Eh? And then you need to give the
condition, in order to get this...commo sais this...open. No? That is the truth.
So it's in the same way a sort of--

The truth is I was living in my intellect, a lot of the years. And then I...I...I...I
realize my limits. I have all kind of limits. My family give me limits. My society give
me limits. The world, the language, the Spanish language give me limits. And then
I start to work in order to broke the rational limits. Lucid dreams, some experience
with gurus, masters, brouhas, searching, meditation, sometimes I...TWICE I take
LSD, TWICE I take mushrooms, with masters, um, Indian masters, Mexican. Et
cetera. And then, in the moment, the walls of the reason went down. I broke the
limits. I make a bridge between the conscious and unconscious. For me now, they
go together, the two. Now. And then the unconscious is not any more my enemy. It
is my ally - my unconscious. And when I need to have something, I put, I ask it,
no? I want to have an idea [gestures like planting a seed], I put there, and the
open flower, alone. I don't make effort.
How important would you say--
 You can prove to me. Ask me something, I can invite something for you and it is
immediately here.

How important do you think reality is in your life? Like the concrete of
reality?

Reality. There are no concrete realities. That also is not true. There is no reality.
Listen, everything you are seeing here [gestures around the room], this girl, this
table, the lake, the walls...in fifty more years will be not here. Not even us.
Nothing, in fifty years. Nothing will be there. No? It's an illusion. It's like a dream all
that. It's changing. Then there are no concrete realities. They are very different,
changing in every second. And the what you call concrete reality have the same
principal of dreams. There is no difference between reality and dreams. It's exactly
the same quality, the same construction. When you come to consciousness, when
you are out of the dream. Eh? That is what I think. I tell you I will say the truth.
And then, myself, I learn, I didn't came like that. One day, I have your age, I was
dreaming, and I became lucid inside the dream, and I said, I am dreaming, into the
dream. And I started to make lucid dreams, from then on my life. And I make
experience inside the dream, though my consciousness opened. When you ask it to
me, Who you are, I don't know who I am now. I am a conscious, without definition.
Eh? I have no definition -- myself. I am into that [gestures at his body], but I am
not that [gestures at his body]. I am into my personality, but I am not my
personality. I am into inside my language, but I am not my language. I have no
nationality. I have no name. I have no sex. I have no...no...no definition. No? And
when you are like that, you can walk into the concrete "reality", and you are
walking in a dream. And in that moment, miracles start to happen. No? Miracles.
Because everything outside is a miracle, but you don't see that, the miracles, you
are not, maybe you is, but not every person, they are not able to see, they are not
out of the dream, they are not lucid. Eh? Okay, this is my answer. [Laughter.] About
concrete reality.

I read something about when you were getting ready to shoot "El Topo",
you searched out the landscapes that related to the dreams of the earth--

I want to say, "El Topo" I made 30 years ago. I was not me--he's a person who
died. Now I die, I was reborn. I'm not me, but I respect the person who make "El
Topo". But he was searching. He have not, he have not find himself, he make the
picture in order to find himself. And when I was in that time there, I went with a
jeep, with a photographer, in the north of Mexico, in some state of dreams, like a
dream, no? And finding places, like dreams. Because in the Mexican industry, they
shot the pictures all the time in the same space, in the same landscape--very easy
for them. I have to find new landscape, new places. I did that, but in a state of
dreams. I find that, no? When you come with the camera, always I shoot reality. In
Mexico I shoot in the street, in the middle of thieves, of criminals. I make "Santa
Sangre", and I was in the worst part of Mexico, very dangerous. And then we speak
with the chief of thieves, and he became the person we pay to him, he became the
person who sees the way, who makes sure nothing happens.
Protection--
But it was very dangerous, very dangerous. But when you come with your picture
to reality, reality, it starts to be a dream. Nothing is any more real with a camera.
You can invent reality when is a commercial picture, or you give a miracle to reality
when it is an artistic picture. Everything is better, is beautiful. Eh? And then when I
direct the picture is not myself. I am completely different. When I make "Santa
Sangre", always like that I sleep for hours, for days. I don't speak with anybody. I
don't want to see friends. In reality I don't sleep with my woman, don't make love,
only dedicate to the picture, not to speak with anybody only when I am shooting, in
a state of ferocity. Criminal ferocity. In order to do that, you know, because in
movies, the only person they say have any real idea, they have an anus. You know
what is anus? Asshole. [Makes image with hand.] They have an idea, they have an
asshole. They have an asshole, and this is his idea. And then you need to say "Shut
up! I don't want ideas here, stop the speak!" Huh? "Is me that is shooting. Close
your mouth!" Everyone have an idea: actor have an idea, the photographer have an
idea, the technician have idea...everybody want to collaborate! But the real picture
is like a poem. You need to do your picture. That I am doing. I am like a criminal,
fighting all the person, in order to do whatever I want. The producer comes...is
awful.

Forestter: Who are you now? You say you are a different person for "El
Topo", a different person for "Holy Mountain", how?

Even my child you see in "Holy Mountain", or in "Santa Sangre", one child now have
20 years. The person who cut their arm is married with two children. Another of my
children who was there 24 years, died, not anymore here. And then everything
changes, is not anymore. Eh? Every one of them, my sons, they are not the same
anymore. Eh? That is what I am saying-life is changing. In every day life we think
we are identical, we are never changing, we are very proud. And then we change,
we are not the same. The problem is, some person dies, and dresses as a person
living. They dress like a person in the 60s, for example, they are the same. They
never change because it is like they died. And a person who wants to have a soul,
dies and is reborn. No? Is reincarnation in yourself. To die and to reincarnated in
yourself, and then you are a new person. You come from the death of yourself, and
you are a new person, and you have a new life, new ideas. And you continue to
create. In the masonry, they put you inside a coffin, and then you go out in the...
Benedictinos monks, Catholic monks, when you go inside the order, they cut your
hair, they wash your feet, they put a new name that doesn't resemble this one.
They are symbols in order to say you died, and you were reborn into a new being,
no? More extense. Maybe I am not answering what you ask?
Forestter: How you kept being reborn between each movie, or--

In every movie, I put everything I am, also what I am not. Searching, everything is
a search. A search of expression, knowledge, a search of emotions, different
searches, no? "Holy Mountain" is an identity search. "Santa Sangre" is an emotional
search--because I was a victim of my parents. And then I want to research how I
feel myself. And I put everything I am, and then I am empty. I cannot make a
picture for years because what I will say, I say everything. What new? Why to make
another picture, repeat myself? I am not making hot dogs. Who I am in one
picture, another picture, a new story but always the same. Each cook makes only
one picture in his life, each cook, he makes the same picture, everything never
changes. He reproduces himself [motions like he's making hot dogs]. Why? Why to
make 40 pictures? Why? Always the same. John Ford is fantastic. You see one or
two, you see all of John Ford. They're the same. Why? Well I am speaking of
pictures as an art. When you speak about industry, there you need to make one a
year. That is different. I am not speaking of movies as an industry. You go into the
industry of movies you make sales. You see the new pictures sell. That is a shame.
Sam: So you make films as a searching device--

Yes! Yes I make films in order to, as an artist makes a film, in order to give myself,
to express, to find something, no? I don't like my pictures. When I see my pictures
I am ashamed. I will never do that, I don't like.
But did they help you to--

But I don't like because I see all things different. Oh, how I could do, why I didn't
do THAT, why I did THAT, no?
But would you say that they served their purpose? Did you find within it
what you were looking for?

Oh yes yes yes yes yes. A lot. Changed my life, every one of my pictures changed
my life. Even the worst, "Tusk". I make in India, with a crook. The producer was a
crook. He said, You'll have an artificial elephant as King Kong. He gives me a
normal elephant. I have nothing. It was terrible. But I learned a lot because I start
to work with elephants. Elephants could be our masters. Animals are our masters.
All the totems, the animal totems have a knowledge in them. I learn a lot in my life
this way. Not the picture but the contact with the elephants change my life. And
how...I have time? I will tell an anecdote? I can? You know, the elephant live 100
years, 90 years. It have only three persons, all the life he work with them. One who
makes the food, another who wash because the animals they like the water, and
then they're happy, and the number three, the master who is the karnak, the three.
And they work all his life with the elephant. And when I come there, I see a little
man who had a hole here [motioning to the shin of his leg], and he have not
medicine, no nothing. And in India, he was not a human being. He was dying. And
then I say to the officer, "I want to do something for him." And he say, "Don't do
nothing, because if he die, they will say you killed him." And then I say, "Let me do
something, without permission." And then I went to him but I don't have nothing
only I have a tonic for the hair. And I put the tonic with alcohol, and creme for
hemorrhoids, I put the creme for hemorrhoids (on his leg) and I pray, in Spanish
[says prayer]. And after a week, he was saved. I saved the guy with that. And then
I start to work with elephants, do everything with elephants. I push the elephants. I
ride the elephants. A lot of things between the 12 elephants, running. And then one
day an officer came, and speak very bad to the karnak, and the elephant did like
this with his trunk [swinging motion], and man went out four meters, with jaw
broken. And then how terrible was an elephant, I did not realize. And the guys
says, "You know you didn't die because I was there." I saved the life of the man
who was all the time with the elephant, saving my life, all the time. It was a
miracle. You know? It was a miracle. I saved the life of the guy, he saved my life. I
could be with the elephants. I knew the attitude of the elephants was very
interesting but I will not tell that here. Every picture changes your life.
Why do you think you exist? Why do you think people exist?

Why people exist...

Do you have an idea?

Is a game of God. [Laughs.] All that is a game. I don't know if people exist. The
meaning of existence... We need to clarify. Eh?

That's why I'm curious as to what you think.

I think that all that is a marvelous dream. And we are in that dream, we are part of
that dream. But I think I don't know why we exist. Eh? But I know what for to do
what to exist. I know the finality of man. That I know. That I can tell you. Man have
three finalities. One finality is to live the same length as the Universe lives. Not to
be immortal, but live the millions of years the Universe lives. That we want as a
human being. We don't want to die before the Universe dies, we want to die WITH
the Universe. That is one. The second is to know all the Universe completely.
Microcosmos, macrocosmos, to know the Universe. We want that. And number
three, to be the consciousness of the Universe--is the way to be the God of the
Universe. That is what we want [shaking his head]. Every one of us wants that.
Do you think any of that's possible?

It's possible. We are a collective being. We are mortal as individuals. But as

collectivity we can be immortal. No? And the human race will do it one day. One
day we will not anymore United States, China, Earth. One day that will disappear.
We will be human race. And we will be travelling in the cosmos. There we'll be. Is
very good we are strangers, is not bad. We are eating the Earth. Why? Because we
will destroy the Earth, and be obliged to go out. [Laughter.] And that is good. This
is what I think, eh? I tell you I will say what I am thinking.
When you think about the possibility of an apocalypse, how do you see
that--

The apocalypse is in my answer. You know, I read the Bible, a lot of times,
completely, New Testament, Old Testament. And the Bible starts the adventure of
the human being when he eats the tree of knowledge- [interuption: cameracrew
distracts Jodorowsky who tells them to continue shooting his interview and not the
scenery outside the window].

Oh I was asking you about how you view the apocalypse.

Well look, the apocalypse is the ending of history, no? The tree of knowledge, yes,
but the tree of eternity, they don't eat. And God say, put out of the Paradise, Adam
and Eve, because one day they will eat the tree of eternity, and they will be like
gods. Well they go out on the adventure. And in the ending, the apocalypse, with
the destruction of everything, Jerusalem celestial comes, and in the center what
they have, the tree of eternity. And the humanity, eats the fruit of eternity, and
becomes eternal. That is the message of the Bible. The apocalypse is positive and
not negative. But in order to come to what we are, we need to clean--our society,
our selves. We need to clean, we need to take out everything, not ourselves. In
order to do what we are. One more. Is not a movie interview, no?
I heard a story that when "Fando and Lis" opened in Mexico there was a
riot?

They want to kill me. Because Mexico making pictures of cowboys, very awful, very
Mexican. And I came to them with a way to do pictures, and they have a shock.
They think it was pornography what I did. That it was a sacrilege. And then they
start to want to lynch me at the Acapulco festival and then I need to come in a car,
they bring me out to save me. And the director, Emilio Fernandez say, I will kill him.
He have killed all ready two guys. And it was true, he could kill me. And that night I
sent two whiskey bottles, I sent two whiskey bottles, and he was very happy and
we become friends. He forgive me and help me, etc. That was the biggest conflict.
Did people want to kill you because of your other movies?

No no no, but in Mexico always they cut my pictures. "El Topo" was cut 60 minutes,
and the "Holy Mountain" they cut 40 minutes. And when "El Topo" was at the
festival of Cannes, they ask my picture for the competition very enthusiastic,
Mexico didn't want it to represent Mexico. Not Mexico, is not the Mexican movie.
And then I could not be in the contests. But later they agree, they say okay, they
understood. I change the mind of the young generation. And then they start to
make artistical pictures. They change. I came there as a catastrophe, because I
was doing whatever I wanted. That is a bad idea. But here in the United States,
when I show "Santa Sangre", they cut "Santa Sangre".

I know--

Why?

That's strange, they didn't cut "El Topo" or "Holy Mountain".

I know, they cut "Santa Sangre". Why? In order to make business maybe. You have
a sense of censorship here.
It's very different here than it is in Europe.

It's incredible!

It's like it's gone back in time.

I went to the video store here, Blockbuster Video, but is awful! They say, the
pictures say "Family Version", as in the plane. I never see a picture in the plane
because they cut the pictures. Incredible no? Well...

It's like that everywhere now.

Yes but here is more now. First here was very free, in the 70s, 60s, and now in
Europe is free, and here, not. Here is very very now [makes twisting fist], is
Protestant mentality. Very very, a lot. Maybe they're afraid of violence, the child
who kills the child in the school. But they think is picture that do that. Is not true! It
is the bad organization of the society that do that, is not the pictures. But always
we need to accuse something. You know, the animal you kill, how do you say in
English? You have the animal you kill and say, He is the guilty.

Forestter: Scapegoat.

And the movies are now that, no? The child violence is because of the movies, no?
Is not true.