Globalisation and the National Imaginary in Contemporary Argentine and Brazilian Cinema Submitted by Natália Pinazza for the degree of PhD of the University of Bath December, 2011 Copyright Attention is drawn to the fact that copyright of this thesis rests with its author. This copy of the thesis has been supplied on condition that anyone who consults it is understood to recognise that its copyright rests with its author and that no quotation from the thesis and no information derived from it may be published without the prior written consent of the author. This thesis may be made available for consultation within the University Library and may be photocopied or lent to other libraries for the purposes of consultation. Acknowledgements First of all, I would like to express my sincerest gratitude to Axel Goodbody and Wendy Everett for encouraging my academic development and for supporting me during my Masters, PhD proposal, funding application and supervision. I am also grateful to Debbie Martin for always offering feedback and for her supervision at the last stages of the thesis. The Overseas Research Student Awards Scheme and the University of Bath have provided funding for my studies and the financial support I have needed to attend conferences. I am very grateful to the SALC (Self-Access Language Centre) staff and to Anne Jordan for her unfailing support during these three years. I am indebted to many friends across the globe. Special thanks goes to my PhD colleagues, who made this experience much more enjoyable, in particular to Bilge, Christos, Dimitris, Fabio, Gabriela and Lenka. My friend Rosa Riádigos and her son, Mateo, made me feel at home during my stay in Buenos Aires. Louis Bayman made valuable comments on my work, and I appreciate his time and perspicacity. I also would like to thank the academic staff of the Department of Hispanic Studies at the University of Sheffield, in particular Phil Swanson, Imma Cristina Roura and Pascale Baker for the support I got in the final stages of my thesis. Melão, Jú Carbonari, Vivien Silvey, Marie France-Savard, Larinda Timu, Annika Månsson were also present during this experience. I would like to thank my family: Pai, Mãe, Camila, avós, tias, tios e primos. They managed to be close even when they were far. Above all, I owe my deepest gratitude to Stuart for his support, encouragement and patience. I dedicate my three years of work to the memory of my grandfather Ezio Appezzato, my godfather Antônio Hermínio Pinazza, and my departmental colleague and friend Rosa Orlando. 2 Abstract The thesis aims to uncover some of the many ways in which contemporary Argentine and Brazilian cinema have registered and helped to construct national identity since the mid 1990s, when, after almost collapsing at the height of the debt crisis of the previous two decades of military dictatorship, film production experienced a boom as a result of new film legislation. The transition from dictatorship to democracy and the adoption of the neoliberal economic model were accompanied by the erosion of the nation-state, an increase in international agreements and the formation of regional blocs such as Mercosur. The thesis draws primarily on postcolonial and film theories to show how the socio-political aspects of the transition engendered changes in the ways in which the nation is constructed. The thesis does this through engaging with discourses pertaining to the formation of supra-national communities via case studies of selected films. Among the questions addressed are the following: How have Argentine and Brazilian films negotiated the impact of globalisation on identities? How have cinematic practices and filmic representations in contemporary Argentine and Brazilian cinemas encouraged critical reflection on the countries‟ position in a global system? I construct an argument in Chapters 1, 2, 3, 4 for the continued relevance of a critical focus on the nation in a globalised era in which trends in criticism are set toward a transnational approach. Chapters 5, 6, and 7 explore how films have re-constructed the national in the face of the growing impact of globalised identities, by engaging with supra-national entities such as diasporic, Lusophone, Ibero-American, and regional communities. Contemporary Argentine and Brazilian films are shown to display complex identity-negotiations in a globalised context and, in turn, pose meta-critical questions for filmic (and more general cultural) analysis in a transnational context. 3 Table of Contents ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 2 ABSTRACT 3 TABLE OF CONTENTS 4 ABBREVIATIONS 6 LIST OF FIGURES 7 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION 8 1. GLOBALISATION AND THE NATIONAL IMAGINARY IN CONTEMPORARY ARGENTINE AND BRAZILIAN CINEMA .............. 8 1. The re-emergence of Argentine cinema .................................................. 10 2. The re-emergence of Brazilian cinema .................................................... 13 2. CONTEMPORARY ARGENTINE AND BRAZILIAN CINEMA AND COMMUNITY BUILDING ........................................... 16 3. AIMS OF THE THESIS .............................................................................................................................. 21 4. THESIS OUTLINE ................................................................................................................................... 23 5. LITERATURE SURVEY .............................................................................................................................. 26 6. METHODOLOGY ................................................................................................................................... 30 CHAPTER 2. LITERATURE REVIEW OF GLOBALISATION AND FILMMAKING IN ARGENTINA AND BRAZIL 33 7. A MOVE AWAY FROM THE NATIONAL AND TRANSNATIONAL BINARY ................................................................ 33 8. THE REGIONAL DIMENSION: LATIN AMERICAN CINEMA IN TRANSITION ............................................................ 44 9. ARGENTINE AND BRAZILIAN NATIONAL CINEMA AND THEIR ‘THIRD WORLD’ STATUS IN A GLOBAL ERA ................... 51 CHAPTER 3. NATIONAL SPACES AND GLOBALISATION 59 10. SERTÃO AND PATAGONIA: THE CORNERSTONES OF THE MODERN STATE ........................................................... 59 11. CINEMATIC RETURN TO THE SERTÃO AND PATAGONIA .................................................................................. 63 12. CENTRAL STATION: FROM THE SEA TO THE SERTÃO ...................................................................................... 66 13. PATAGONIA AS A REFUGE IN BORN AND BRED ............................................................................................ 75 14. CONCLUSION ....................................................................................................................................... 81 CHAPTER 4. EUROPEAN IMMIGRATION IN ARGENTINE AND BRAZILIAN NARRATIVES OF NATIONHOOD 86 15. EUROPEAN HERITAGE AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF ARGENTINE IDENTITY: BAR EL CHINO AND INHERITANCE ........... 87 16. ESCAPING MODERNITY: CINEMA, ASPIRINS AND VULTURES ........................................................................ 101 17. CONCLUSION ..................................................................................................................................... 107 CHAPTER 5. THE ‘EUROPEANNESS’ OF ARGENTINE AND BRAZILIAN CINEMA ................................. 111 18. CHALLENGING FIXED NOTIONS OF EUROPEAN AND LATIN AMERICAN CINEMA ................................................. 112 19. IN SEARCH OF A EUROPEAN IDENTITY: THE HUNGARIAN PASSPORT .............................................................. 116 20. DETERRITORIALISING AND RETERRITORIALISING JOURNEYS .......................................................................... 121 21. SELF-REFLEXIVITY ON DISPLACEMENT AND THE FILMMAKING PROCESS .......................................................... 125 22. EUROPEAN CITIZENSHIP AND ESCAPISM: LOST EMBRACE ............................................................................ 130 23. CONCLUSION ..................................................................................................................................... 140 CHAPTER 6. THE FORMER COLONISER AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF A GLOBALISED NATIONAL IDENTITY 145 24. REVERSE MIGRATION: FROM ARGENTINA AND BRAZIL TO THE IBERIAN PENINSULA .......................................... 147 25. GLOBALISATION AND IBERO-AMERICAN CINEMA ...................................................................................... 149 26. LANGUAGE AND COLONIAL ANXIETY ....................................................................................................... 151 27. DISPLACEMENT AS A RESULT OF ECONOMIC AND IDENTITY CRISIS .................................................................. 158 28. RE-TERRITORIALISATION AND THE COLONIAL PAST ..................................................................................... 168 CHAPTER 7. CINEMA AND MERCOSUR: NEGOTIATING REGIONAL IDENTITY .................................. 177 4 29. JOURNEY AND BORDER CROSSING: THE MOTORCYCLE DIARIES AND ROLLING FAMILY ...................................... 179 30. WORKING AT BORDER CROSSING POINTS: THE POPE’S TOILET ..................................................................... 188 31. BORDERS AS A GETAWAY: THE FISH CHILD .............................................................................................. 197 32. CONCLUSION ....................................................................................................................................