NERUDA – Review

Gael Garcia Bernal as Oscar Peluchonneau, the police detective tracking poet/politician Pablo Neruda in NERUDA. Photo courtesy of The Orchard ©

Pablo Larrain gained attention with American audiences with his stunning drama JACKIE, about Jackie Kennedy immediately after the assassination, but the Chilean-born director has another outstanding film opening in theaters now. The Spanish-language NERUDA focuses on Nobel Prize winning poet, essayist and politician Pablo Neruda, a beloved national figure in his native Chile and throughout South America, who became a target of a political crackdown after WWII.

NERUDA is both an entertaining and intellectually stimulating film. Rather than a conventional biopic, director Larrain tells this story as a chase, with the poet/politician pursued by a police detective played by Gale Garcia Bernal.. NERUDA has a streak of dark humor and begins with strong film noir elements, which eventually give way to the surreal, while exploring Neruda’s life and work. The film tells Neruda’s story by putting one in a Neruda-esque story,  a very clever trick indeed. NERUDA is part history, part surreal fantasy, and a brilliantly complex piece of cinema that rewards viewers with a fuller exploration of who Neruda was, as a giant of literature and an iconic Chilean cultural figure, than a mere biopic could.

One does not have to be familiar with Neruda to enjoy this film but it helps if you know who Augusto Pinochet was. If the name is unfamiliar, reading up a bit on the Chilean dictator and South American history might be useful.

Both Pinochet and Pablo Picasso make briefly appearances in the film. However, the film opens a few years after the end of  World War II, as the world is undergoing a change in political winds. During WW II, the Soviet Union had been one of the Allies fighting Nazi Germany but with the dawning Cold War, the tide shifted against the communists. Like many multi-political party countries, Chile had elected officials from their Communist Party, including Senator Pablo Neruda (Luis Gnecco). The Nobel laureate poet is beloved by Chileans of all classes, but as a Senator,  Neruda’s leftist views bring him in conflict with Chile’s new right-leaning president Gabriel Gonzales Videla.

Middle-aged, balding, overweight and living a life of comfortable affluence, Senator Neruda is far more the stereotypical picture of a Senator than some wild, Che Guevara-like rebel living in the jungle – something director Larrain has a bit of ironic fun with. Along with his aristocratic artist wife Delia (Mercedes Moran),Neruda lives a celebrity’s high life of parties and creature comfort but still maintains his sympathy and concern for the Chilean poor, the class from which he arose.

When the new Chilean president decides to outlaw the Communist Party, the senator becomes a wanted man and is forced into hiding. A police detective, Oscar Peluchonneau (Gael Garcia Bernal), is assigned to catch the fugitive poet/politician.

The detective is a fictional character, something that comes into play later in the film. Larrain skillfully mixes fact and fiction, history and fantasy, in his tale, with the aim to illuminate Neruda’s life, character and work.

Peluchonneau pursues Neruda with the obsession of Javert chasing Jean Valjean in “Les Miserables.” It is one of several literary references and devices director Larrain employs along with several other literary references, as well as drenching the film in lush film noir style.  The film starts out as a stylish ’40s type film noir, with narration and slanting light, but drifts into the surreal by its striking conclusion.

The film is visually stunning and lush, with images that begin in the vein of ’40s crime film and expand into the vistas of a Western.  While the film’s visual beauty is one of its delights, Larrain also uses it to convey meaning and mood. As Neruda is pursued, scenes have a sense of being closed in, of confinement and cramped quarters, achieved by close ups and tight shots. Even when Neruda is on a road high in the Andes mountain seeking to flee his homeland, the very mountains seem to hem him in.

Bernal is excellent in this film as the detective, a character that is used to explore Neruda’s works, both poetry and novels, and the intersection of fiction and reality. Gnecco as Neruda himself actually has the smaller role but delivers a fine performance nonetheless. At one point, the poet leaves a copy of one of his books behind for the detective to find, sparking the hunter to become one of the prey’s many readers and opening the detective a journey of self-discovery as well. The director seems to have endless fun taking us down intriguing intellectual rabbit holes, and then bringing us up short with sudden human insights.

Of course, Neruda is not being hunted for being a poet but for his political views. Still, Neruda’s status as beloved figure at all levels of Chilean society and his standing internationally leaves the ruling government in a quandary. Hunting him suits their new anti-communist stance but actually catching and jailing the Nobel laureate has the potential for international embarrassment. So the policeman pursues him with little backup, a solitary figure in the landscape. As the pursuit unfolds, the hunt reaches to remote landscapes, with the hint of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s “Frankenstein” as the monster pursues his creator to the ends of the earth.

Larrain is clearly fond of the poet but that doesn’t stop him from engaging in a little fun-making of his contradictions and foibles, while still admiring his genius and commitment to humanity. Neruda’s political views come across as rooted in the poet’s kind heart more than strict ideology.. At one point, the chubby, aging poet and his born-to-wealth wife talk about fleeing the capital by just jumping on a couple of horses and leaving all behind. Noting that they are both from the south and grew up riding, the couple spins a romantic fantasy of themselves as rebels on the run. When late in the film, Neruda is actually compelled to ride a horse to escape, he can barely climb aboard, an absurdly funny little touch that underscores the intersection between imaginative fantasy and practical facts. In a novel, it would be no problem for the writer but on a remote snowy farm, Neruda’s middle-aged bulk causes a real horse to balk.

While NERUDA is structured as a chase, that chase is at times rather slow-motion. For some American audiences, the slower pace might dull their interest in the hunt, but patience is rewarded in the richness of the real story being told. This film is not about the chase but what the journey uncovers, about who Neruda was, about the intersection of poetry and politics, and about the path of history and humanity. The considered pace allows the director to interject thoughtful commentary and observations on Neruda himself, on his works and even bits of his writing, to better reveal who he is – as well as who the police detective is.

By the film’s end, you may feel you have a bit of insight on why Neruda is so revered in his homeland. Filled with human insights, moving performances and lush visual images, the semi-surreal NERUDA is a fuller exploration of a complex figure, and one hell of a splendid film.

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars