FILMS WORTH WATCHING by Robert Alstead

A young Che motorcycles through South America

The Motorcycle Diaries (Diarios de Motocicleta), which opened at the Vancouver International Film Festival and is now out on general theatrical release, explores the political awakening of revolutionary pin-up Ernesto (Che) Guevara as a young man. Breaking from his studies at medical school, the 23-year-old asthmatic Che and his 29-year-old doctor friend Alberto Grenado set off from Buenos Aires in 1952 to cross the South American continent on a clapped-out Norton motorbike (jokingly referred to as The Mighty One).
The often amusing differences between the two men - the one libidinous and carefree the other steadfast and idealistic - come immediately into focus at an early stop in the trip at the villa of Che’s girlfriend, daughter of an affluent and disapproving family. The romantic Che (Gael Garcia Bernal, seen previously in Y Tu Mama Tambien) bristles at Grenado’s (Rodrigo De la Serna) strongly worded advice to have his way with the girl so they can embark on the next stage of the journey.
In spite of their differences, close scrapes and sobering experiences draw the two men together. The longer they travel, often through fascinating landscapes, the more both of them are affected by the legacy of Latin America’s colonial past. Encounters with spiritually crushed peasants and a long stint working with patients on a remote Amazonian leper colony run by nuns, further stirs their sense of responsibility to those less well off.
The Motorcycle Diaries stops short of showing how Che evolves into a soldier of the revolution, which is in keeping with the warm-hearted and surprisingly uncontroversial nature of the film. The appeal is in the way director Walter Salles, as he did in his similarly sentimental but enjoyable road movie Central Station, uses his charismatic duo to call for human compassion and strength of spirit in adversity.
Strength of spirit can be found in spades in What Remains of Us, sponsored by Common Ground at the Vancouver International Film Festival (October 6 at 12 noon, Granville 1 and October 7 at 7:30 pm, Granville 1). There have been many documentaries about the invasion and subsequent ethnic cleansing of Tibet by the People’s Republic of China, but the power of this documentary by Francois Prevost and Hugo Latulippe is that it allows ordinary people in Tibet to talk to the outside world about their struggle and hopes.
Kalsang Dolma, a feisty young Tibetan woman who has found refuge in Quebec, smuggled into Tibet a videotaped message from the Dalai Lama calling for continuing peaceful resistance. The filmmakers taped Tibetans’ reactions before, during and after playing the message back on a portable video recorder. The simple idea has a powerful effect, releasing a mixture of sadness, amazement, tears of joy, and hope as, often bowed in humility with hands clasped, young and old absorb the Dalai Lama’s inspirational words. For some of the elders listening, it is the first time they have seen him since his exile in 1959. Considering the film was shot secretively on a small DV camera it’s well put together, and brings home the remarkable resilience of this simple people under conditions of such pervasive oppression.
Also opening
As well as a smattering of horror movies, the Halloween season brings us Finding Neverland (opening on October 22), the affectionate account of troubled Scottish author J.M. Barrie and his most famous creation Peter Pan. An imaginative tearjerker set at the beginning of the last century, it stars Johnny Depp as Barrie and Kate Winslett as a widowed mother of four young children that Barrie befriends one day while playing with his dog in the park.
Ray (opening on October 29) a biopic of the late pianist Ray Charles (played by Jamie Foxx), charts his life from humble beginnings in Georgia, childhood tragedy which saw him turn blind at seven and then grow into one of the most influential musicians of his generation.
Robert Alstead writes for iofilm.



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