ERENDIRA

West Germany, 1983, 103 minutes, Colour.
Irene Papas, Claudia Ohana, Michel Lonsdale, Rufus.
Directed by Ruy Guerra.

Erendira is a lavish fantasy fable from stories by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother and Death Constant Beyond Love). The author has adapted his own stories. The film was directed by Brazilian Ruy Guerra, prominent in the cinema of the '60s but who went to work in Mozambique to establish the television industry. n In the early '80s he returned to film-making with Erendira.

The film is surreal - with echoes of directors like Bunuel and Fellini. Irene Pappas enjoys herself as the monstrous and heartless grandmother, almost indestructible in her savagery.

The film is obviously an allegory about the contemporary world: about control and exploitation, about innocence and the loss of innocence, about the ineffectualness of heroes - and ultimate disappointment and lack of achievement and redemption. Some commentators have likened the film to those made from books by Angela Carter, a blend of realism, mystery, magic and message.

1. The impact of the film as fantasy, fable? A black fairy tale?

2. The work of Ruy Guerra? South America, Africa, Europe? The writing of Marquez?

3. The use of locations; the desert, real and surreal, the mansion and its environment, the town? The special effects and the score?

4. The plot and its plausibility, credibility? The outline of seeming realism? The fantasy and imagination and turns of plot within this? Dreams and nightmares?

5. The focus on Erendira: the innocent, in her family, work, victim? The, background of the two women in the house? The robbers? Her grandmother as an eccentric tyrant? The lifestyle, slavery and waiting on her grandmother?

6. The accidental lighting of the fire, the conflagration of the house, the impact for Erendira and her grandmother?

7. The effect of the fire: Erendira's debt, the grandmother and her selling off what remained, her demands on Erendira to repay all the lost money? The calculation of time? The decision to set Erendira up in the tent? The long line of men? The innocent corrupted?

8. Ulysses as the Prince Charming, the hero? His falling in love with Erendira? The lyrical relationship? The plan? His various attempts to rescue Erendira and to kill the grandmother? His being caught? The oranges - the diamonds?

9. Erendira in the convent, the young man and the marriage ceremony? The return to the tent and her going on the road? The bribery of the officials? Erendira padlocked?


10. Ulysses and the demands of Erendira to kill the grandmother: poison and the nightmares, the hair coming out? The explosion - and the grandmother demanding more repayment? The final stabbing, the ugliness of the ooze and the green blood?

11. The irony of Erendira's taking the money, going west and escaping into the desert - only her footprints? The disappointment of Ulysses?

12. The background characters and their contribution: the senator and his relationship with Ulysses, Ulysses' mother? The photographer? The various people in the town? The military? The men? The missionary? The prostitutes? The nuns?

13. The meanings of the film - as regards human nature, in a European setting, in a Latin American setting?