FILM 5: Kamchatka (Argentina, Marcelo Piñyero, 2002), 106 min., CANVAS

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Kamchatka (Argentina, 2002)

Directed by Marcelo Piñeyro (b. 1953)

Screenplay by Marcelo Figueras and Marcelo Piñeyro

Dvd Buenos Aires: Argentina Home Video, 2002, 105 min.

Synopsis:

In 1976 Buenos Aires a professional couple and their two young sons flee from the political crackdown on leftists following the military coup, taking refuge in a house in the countryside. The parents teach the children strategies for survival, largely through game playing, and the older son, ‘Harry,’ adopts escape artist Harry Houdini as his role model. At one point they take in another political refugee, ‘Lucas.’ Everyone in the family adopts an assumed name, and the boys are warned to never contact their friends in Buenos Aires.

Cast:

Matías del Pozo                    Harry

Milton de la Canal                 Simón/El Enano (the Dwarf)

Ricardo Darín                        Dad

Cecilia Roth                           Mom

Tomás Fonzi                         Lucas

Héctor Alterio                       Grandfather

Questions:

  1. Analyze the framing of the story by the narrator.
  2. Explain what “Kamchatka” symbolizes, both in the board game Risk (T.E.G., Tactics and Strategies of War) between Harry and his father, and in the family’s lives. Is there any Orientalism or ‘othering’ involved in the symbolism?
  3. Comment on the film’s cinematography. How are darkness and shadow, night and day, used symbolically? How is the countryside contrasted with the city of Buenos Aires?
  4. What atmosphere is conveyed by the road block at the beginning of the film?
  5. What role do television programs and other forms of popular culture play in the family’s political and imaginative life? Is it significant that the TV programs and many other elements of popular culture in the film are from the U.S.?
  6. Later the film makes extensive use of Latin American popular music from the 1970s. Do you think a Latin American viewer now in their fifties or sixties might relate differently to this film than you do?
  7. Who are Harry and Simón ‘named’ after and what are their real names?
  8. Compare the role played by Harry’s mother with that of his best friend Bertucci’s mother; which of them corresponds to a more traditional ideal of femininity?
  9. What do Harry’s mother and father do for a living? What do we know about their political activities and beliefs? How do they, and Bertucci’s family, fit into the sociopolitical panorama of Argentina in the mid 1970s?
  10. Even though the family is away from home, they manage to make the country house homey. What objects and behaviors do they use to construct their home-away-from-home? What do they seem to miss?
  11. What sort of a relationship does Harry’s father have with his own father, and how does it relate to the “generation gap” of the 1960s and early 1970s? Does he try to establish a different kind of relationship with his own sons? How do you think this will affect their development in the future?
  12. Describe the relationship between Harry and El Enano.
  13. Does the family strike you as too idealized to seem realistic?
  14. How is Catholicism portrayed? Why does El Enano find it attractive? Does the film implicitly criticize it?
  15. What do the frogs and the swimming pool symbolize? What about Houdini? The game of “zafarrancha” that the boys play with their father?
  16. Why don’t Harry and El Enano’s parents tell them what sort of danger they are in? Do you think they make the right decision about this?
  17. What role does Lucas play in the family’s lives, and specifically in that of Harry? What becomes of him?
  18. Why does Harry return to Buenos Aires? Is he responsible for what happens to the family at the end? Is there any sense of guilt apparent in his voiceover narration?
  19. Explain the significance of the scene in the garage at Bertucci’s house, and the behavior of Bertucci’s mother. What comment is being made about the divisions within Argentinean society at the time?
  20. What does the relationship between the grandparents and the children at the end of the film portend about Argentinean society of the 1990s and 2000s?
  21. How does each of the parents say good-bye, and what does this say about them?
  22. Compare Kamchatka to other films about the Argentine and Chilean ‘Dirty Wars,’ Machuca, and Crónica de una fuga/Chronicle of an Escape, including their effects on you as a spectator.
  23. How do you think your perception of this film is different, after having just seen Chronicle of an Escape?
  24. This film fits into the tradition of the bildüngsroman or coming-of-age story. What does Harry learn from these experiences about his family, his society, and human nature? What do you imagine will become of him as an adult? What challenges will face his society then? Compare this film to Machuca as a bildungsroman.
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