Salvador (1986)

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Movie
German title Salvador
Original title Salvador
Country of production United States
original language English , Spanish
Publishing year 1986
length 123 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director Oliver Stone
script Rick Boyle ,
Oliver Stone
production Gerald Green ,
Oliver Stone
music Georges Delerue
camera Robert Richardson
cut Claire Simpson
occupation

Salvador is an American drama film directed by Oliver Stone from 1986 . James Woods depicts a photographer who visits the civil war- torn Latin American country El Salvador during the 1980s and is confronted with the atrocities there. Much of the framework story is based on real events .

action

The American reporter Richard Boyle used to be very successful in his career. In the meantime, however, it is difficult for him to get orders because he is too uncomfortable and has messed with too many clients. There is also an alcohol problem and trouble with his wife, who leaves him with her baby. Boyle scrapes his last money together and drives with his friend Doctor Rock to Salvador, where he started his career with a few articles. In Salvador, Richard has a girlfriend from previous visits who is practically his second wife. Doc Rock, on the other hand, who was actually just looking for some fun, is completely overwhelmed by the political situation, as a military dictatorship rules that suppresses the population and, in part, kills them arbitrarily .

Boyle finds himself in the middle of the political turmoil of the ruling civil war and realizes that the American secret service CIA is helping to suppress the country's opposition . Ambassador Thomas Kelly, accredited in El Salvador , has liberal views and wants to improve the situation, but is powerless in the face of misery. The film character Kelly is probably based on Robert White , who was ambassador there from 1980 to 1981, represented similar views and was finally recalled by Washington.

Boyle witnesses the murder of Archbishop Oscar Romero by a member of a right-wing death squad , with the director making reference to real events. He photographs mounds on which bodies lie after massacres, as well as the bodies of four American nuns who were murdered in 1980. The latter are also portrayed in the film with their lives and work.

The reporter, who was originally in contact with the rebels as well as the rulers, comes under increasing pressure when he tries to smuggle his pictures and those of his murdered colleague John Cassady out of the country. In addition, the rulers are looking for the family of his girlfriend María, so that Boyle marries them in order to flee with her. After various bribes and always on the verge of arrest, both manage to leave the country. However , María is not allowed into the country at the border with the USA . She is arrested and sent back to Salvador while her husband enters his homeland.

background

Oliver Stone shot Salvador independently of Hollywood, financed with English funds. Filming took place in Mexico , California and Nevada . The production costs were estimated at 4.5 million US dollars , which allows conclusions to be drawn about the difficult financing of the film and the resistance in the USA to the project, which was perceived as uncomfortable. That was not surprising, since with Salvador the American Central America policy (see also Reagan Doctrine ) of the government of Ronald Reagan was violently attacked. The film grossed only about $ 1.5 million in US cinemas.

Stone wrote the script together with the "real" Richard Boyle, who had processed his own experiences as a journalist in El Salvador in 1980/81. The real events were condensed in terms of time and location. As a result, the scriptwriters were accused of having falsified historical facts, such as the Romero assassination, and of exaggerating some events such as the murder of the nuns. Stone's film, however, deliberately refuses to take an objective point of view and replaces it with Boyle's subjective and thus partisan gaze, which changes from an uninvolved observer to directly affected.

The model for the Cassady role was the photographer John Hoagland. His death in Salvador was the direct consequence of his professional motto: “To find the truth, you have to get close. If you go too close, you go on it! "

The political explosiveness of the film can also be seen in the fact that it was banned in Honduras in 1987 at the request of the military leadership as a “violation of state security ” and as a support for the “ subversion of the left” .

Other films showing the work of journalists in extreme political situations are The Killing Fields , Under Fire , A Year in Hell , Welcome to Sarajevo and Hunting Party - When the Hunter Becomes the Hunted . Above all , Under Fire with Nick Nolte , set in Nicaragua , shows parallels to Salvador, as the protagonist has also developed from an apparently neutral reporter to a participant in the political events in a Central American country ruled by a dictatorship .

Reviews

Roger Ebert wrote in the Chicago Sun-Times on April 25, 1986 that the film contained too many sub-strands of the plot. His “heart”, however, is fascinating.

Hellmuth Karasek wrote in Der Spiegel in 1987 :

“... El Salvador in the film (as in reality) is a country that is drowning in blood and despair. Even with the guerrillas, Stone's film does not tend towards sheer heroization, their terror is not suppressed: while retreating, a partisan leader, not differentiated from the military, shoots all prisoners in the neck. The dilemma of the 'Salvador' film arises from the fact that Stone looks at the Central American civil war and its incredible bestiality from the perspective of a journalistic warrior. As an eyewitness account, it had the advantage of being authentic. The film, which constantly takes pictures of this photo desperado in action, loses its credibility in wild west games ... "

- Hellmuth Karasek

The critic Leonard Maltin 1990: “Effective propaganda, often potent drama; it takes time to grab hold because lead characters Woods and Belushi are such incredible sleazeballs. Woods' dynamic performance makes up for a lot. "

Time Out magazine found the film " polemical " but praised the action scenes.

Lexicon of the international film : “An authentic reconstruction of the most important events ... of the civil war in El Salvador as well as the interdependence of the American government, which is clearly against the questionable US commitment and for human rights, but the visual presentation is just blood-soaked , offers a striking spectacle. "

Awards

James Woods was nominated for an Oscar in 1987 for Best Actor . The screenwriters received another Oscar nomination .

James Woods won the Independent Spirit Award in 1987 . The five nominations included those for the female lead of Elpidia Carrillo, for directing, for the script and for the cinematography. Rick Boyle and Oliver Stone were nominated for the 1987 Writers Guild of America Award . Oliver Stone as director and the film won the 1987 Kansas City Film Critics Circle Award .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ shortnews
  2. ↑ cit. n. Horst Schäfer / Wolfgang Schwarzer: From 'Che' to 'Z'. Political thriller in the cinema . Frankfurt am Main 1991, p. 333
  3. ↑ epd -Meldung of 11 July 1987 quoted in Shepherd / Black, p 334
  4. ^ Review by Roger Ebert
  5. ↑ Film: Western and Truth , in: Der Spiegel No. 26 of June 22, 1987
  6. ^ Leonard Maltin: TV Movies and Video Guide. 1990 edition, p. 952
  7. ^ Criticism in Time Out
  8. ↑ Salvador. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed April 26, 2017 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used