Review by Barbara Snitzer
No! is an ambitious movie and while it features an engaging performance from its lead actor, Gael Garcia Bernal, it falls short of the high bar set by critics after it was shown at Cannes and having earned a nomination as Best Foreign Film at this year’s Oscars.
While I had general knowledge of Chile’s history involving its rule under the dictator Augusto Pinochet, I wonder if even the average art-house movie goer will even know what I knew going in. The backstory text slides which appear as the movie starts are not sufficient to bring the audience up to speed when the story begins. I felt I should have known more before seeing the movie to fully appreciate this story. This point probably only applies to only a segment of the American audience; the rest of the world, particularly audiences in South America are more familiar with the events. But the movie is opening this weekend in the United States where it may not enjoy the success to which it has become accustomed.
The attention to detail is praiseworthy. Archival footage is seamlessly woven in with the movie which was shot on Sony U-Matic ¾ inch low resolution tape, a format used during the late 1980s, the era during which the movie takes place.
The film is set in 1988 and centers on the second election Chile’s 1980 constitution allows every eight years to determine the continuation of military rule. As happened in the first of these elections in 1980 and tends to be the case when elections are held under dictators, it is viewed by the majority as a formality, if not a sham, that will not alleviate the brutality that has been leveled against many Chileans by their leader, General Augusto Pinochet.
This time, an opposition group emerges, hopeful they can beat the dictator at his own game. The movie doesn’t make clear who these people are or how they assembled themselves. The only detail revealed as an aside is that some of their funding is coming from the United States, ironically the party responsible for installing Pinochet as dictator in the first place.
The group recruits a successful advertising executive, René Saavedra (Bernal) to oversee the fifteen minutes of television airtime allotted to each side in the days leading up to the vote. Saavedra decides on happy, 80s color saturated images rather than reminding people of the brutality exhibited by the regime. He calls it “a drag” and fears it will cultivate apathy that will inhibit a large turnout.
Saavedra’s actions lead to threats and surveillance but none of the violent consequences his fellow citizens have endured. Consequently, he continues his campaign that promises “Happiness” will come to Chile by voting “No.”
It was hard for me to reconcile the happy pop-culture campaign with the horror that occurred under Pinochet’s brutal reign. He was eventually indicted for war crimes and was rescued from justice by his old age and infirmity.
There are some scenes and dialogue that affirm this eventuality. This fact makes it even harder to believe that no one was killed or hurt during the contentious campaign, as a character in the film remarks.
Nevertheless, the film is an important history lesson, and it is surprising to see the campaign ads that Hollywood stars made for the “No” effort.
However, its importance isn’t commensurate with its ability to stand on its own as a film that engages and challenges an audience. It is for this reason, that my vote for No! is sadly a “no.”
3 of 5 Stars
NO opens in St. Louis Friday March 29th at Landmark’s Tivoli Theater
