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Durham E-Theses Pulling focus: New perspectives on the work of Gabriel Figueroa Higgins, Ceridwen Rhiannon How to cite: Higgins, Ceridwen Rhiannon (2007) Pulling focus: New perspectives on the work of Gabriel Figueroa, Durham theses, Durham University. Available at Durham E-Theses Online: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/2579/ Use policy The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that: • a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in Durham E-Theses • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. Please consult the full Durham E-Theses policy for further details. Academic Support Oce, Durham University, University Oce, Old Elvet, Durham DH1 3HP e-mail: [email protected] Tel: +44 0191 334 6107 http://etheses.dur.ac.uk Pulling Focus: New Perspectives on the Work of Gabriel Figueroa by Ceridwen Rhiannon Higgins University of Durham 2007 Submitted for Examination for Degree of PhD 1 1 JUN 2007 Abstract This thesis examines the work of Mexican cinematographer Gabriel Figueroa (1907 -1997) and suggests new critical perspectives on his films and the contexts within which they were made. Despite intense debate over a number of years, auteurist notions in film studies persist and critical attention continues to centre on the director as the sole giver of meaning to a film. Consequently, scholars and critics have overlooked the cinematographer's contribution. The small amount of work that exists on Figueroa, in keeping with studies on other cinematographers, is biographical and anecdotal, concentrating on his personal life rather than his contribution to Mexican cinema. Therefore, this thesis proposes a critical evaluation of Figueroa's cinematography and advocates new analytical paradigms to examine his work. The study constructs its arguments from close visual analysis of Figueroa's films, his unpublished autobiographical writings, letters and related documents within the theoretical and critical contexts of film and Mexican cultural studies. From an overview of how scholars have neglected cinematography in the past, the thesis deconstructs widespread assumptions that relate Figueroa to notions of the national and focuses attention on the inherent transnational economic, political and ideological relationships that informed his images. Through close analysis of eight films I will examine how Figueroa expressed such transnational contexts in relation to: sound in the nascent Mexican industry, race and class in the rural space, urban modernity and the role of the mother and Figueroa's visual critique of the Mexican bourgeoisie. To pull focus shifts attention from one object in the frame to another. This study shifts critical focus onto Figueroa's contribution to the Mexican and international film industries. In so doing, it offers new analytical standpoints from which to evaluate not only Figueroa as a giver of meaning within Mexican cinema, but to also suggest alternative critical positions from which to view cinematography and its complex ties to, and expression of, a film's political, economic and ideological contexts. 2 Acknowledgements With grateful thanks to Andrea Noble for her help and guidance. My research and thinking behind this thesis would not have been possible without the generous contribution and support of Gabriel Figueroa Flores. Many thanks to Celia Barrientos and Ivan Trujillo for providing the best prints and private screenings at the Filmoteca de la UNAM during the period 1998-1999, together with the cacaros of the Sala Fosforo in San Idelfonso who provided useful insights into the films. A special thanks to Michael Stevenson whose enthusiasm and steady encouragement gave me the confidence to finish this project. My thanks to Helen for her friendship and intellectual brilliance, Anne for her threats to get me into the boxing ring with her if I didn't finish the thesis, Babs and Bezzers the steam team and El Gato Moby for his cosy company on some very dark days. Finally, my love and endless gratitude to Rata Sucia and El Polio for their unfailing support, love and hugs - this study is as much their work as mine. The thesis is dedicated to: Mum (1922-2004), Dad (1920-2007) Carol (1954-2004) and Mariana (1925-2002) 4. Contents Abstract 2 Acknowledgments 4 Introduction 5 Chapter 1 Cinematography and Cinematographers 30 Chapter 2 Inventing Mexico: Going Beyond the 'Fermindez-Figueroa Style' 54 Chapter 3 Composing Transnationalism: Visual Style and Song in Allti en el Rancho Grande 93 Chapter 4 Figueroa and the Rural Space 122 Chapter 5 Figueroa's City 161 Chapter 6 Exterminating Visions: The Collaboration of Figueroa and Luis Bufiuel 189 Concluding Remarks 220 Bibliography 227 Appendix i Filmography 249 Appendix ii Synopses of films discussed in thesis 276 Appendix iii Figueroa's awards 291 Appendix iv Glossary of technical terms 298 Index ofDVD clips 308 DVD of sequences analysed in thesis Introduction Figueroa ha sido no solo sin6nimo del cine mexicano sino de Mexico. (Tomas Perez Turrent, 1997a) Cinematographer Gabriel Figueroa (1907 -1997) is widely recognised as one of the founding fathers of Mexican cinema and has come to occupy a privileged position in the national cultural pantheon. Given the auteurist inclinations of much film scholarship, with its focus on the director's creative input into the making of the moving image, this is, to say the least, unusual. Scholars have tended to overlook the collaborative nature of creative filmmaking and whilst they might praise the visual quality of a film, it is rare that they grant the cinematographer more than a brief mention. Even the few figures in the industry with a similar status to Figueroa, such as Gregg Toland (US), Sven Nikqvist (Sweden), Vittorio Storaro (Italy), Freddie Young and Jack Cardiff (UK), have not received the critical and popular recognition in their native countries to compare with the celebrity that Figueroa has sustained in Mexico. More importantly, and central to this study, neither have these cinematographers' images played such a major part in the formation of their respective national imaginaries in the way that those of Figueroa have done. Numerous books, television programmes, journal articles and magazines, dedicated to Figueroa and his work, demonstrate the popular esteem in which the man and his contribution to cinematography are held. In November 2005, this status was reconfirmed with the publication of an edited edition of his memoirs (Soler Frost 2005). 1 Retrospectives of his work take place regularly at home and abroad and exhibitions of stills taken from his light tests are organised. 2 Reproductions of his images hang in cantinas and shops reverentially named Cafe Enamorada, Restaurant Maria Candelaria and Abarrotes La Perla. Throughout his career, Figueroa received numerous accolades, nationally and internationally and in 2007 there are plans to celebrate his centenary. 3 In short, both Figueroa and the images he created 5 have been central to Mexican culture and society for over sixty years. They are icons of the national cinema and as Perez Turrent suggests, have become synonymous with Mexico itself in the popular imagination. The aim of this study is to 'pull focus' on Figueroa's work to suggest reasons why his images have acquired such iconic status. The intention is not to situate Figueroa as a substitute auteur, but rather to critically recognise that film production is inherently collaborative and, in so doing, acknowledge the close creative partnership between the cinematographer and the director in the production of meaning in a film. On close examination of Figueroa's work, fissures appear between the images and the themes of the films which compromise the post-revolutionary nationalism that scholars have uncritically assumed they embody. On further investigation, these contradictions reveal a complex set of transnationalist influences and contexts which are present, not only in Figueroa's work, but also within the Mexican film industry itself. 4 Indeed, Perez Turrent's suggestion that Figueroa 'is Mexico' transforms into a conundrum. Is Figueroa Mexico? Is Mexico Figueroa's? If the cinematographer is associated with the Mexico he created, what is that Mexico, how did he produce it and why? Furthermore, despite the constant acknowledgement of the importance of his work, it is significant that, to date, there has been little in-depth critical analysis of the images that investigates this cultural puzzle. Nor, indeed, have the reasons as to why Figueroa is so central to the cinematic and cultural pantheon of Mexico been explored. How and why has his work become so integral to visual constructions of national identity? The beauty of the images and the charismatic personality that produced them subtly seduce and it is easy to fall under their spell. Much of the work on Figueroa has been anecdotal and biographical. For example, Elena Poniatowska's book La mirada que limpia (1996) juxtaposes interviews between the author and Figueroa, his wife Antonieta, his son Gabriel and his daughters Maria and Tolita. Poniatowska centres her questions on personal 6 details and the family's subjective views of Figueroa to produce an intimate portrait of the man. 5 Alberto Issac's Conversaciones con Gabriel Figueroa (1993) and Farouk Thayer's article 'La puissance du nair et blanc', concentrate on Figueroa's career and his stories about the films he shot and the people with whom he worked. The dedicated issue of Artes de Mexico (1988) is also mainly biographical and includes personal testimonies by Figueroa's friends and colleagues. There is much of interest in these studies, but ultimately they perpetuate the mythic status that has built up around the cinematographer and his work.