MIAMI.- On May 17, 1984, Argentine cinema premiered Camilaa film that addresses the history of a beautiful aristocrat and a priest, who escape from the military authorities and the clergy to live their romance. And 40 years after the release of this film, which obtained an Oscar nomination for best foreign film, its protagonists -Sus Pecoraro and Imanol Arias- spoke about the production and the effect it had on the seventh art.
“More than conscious because it happens when I walk down the street… he (Imanol Arias) always tells his anecdote in an airport and I can’t walk without them telling me: ‘Camila, my daughter’s name is Camila, my granddaughter’s name is Camila.’ ‘, or a big lady: ‘My name is Camila,'” actress Sus Pecoraro, 71, told the Argentine press.
“She lived it much more directly because she lived it here throughout Latin America, because the one who traveled the world with the film was Sus… I say that she gave me a country,” added the Spanish actor Imanol Arias, 68 years old. .
For Pecoraro, the effect that Camila It was due – in part – to the delivery of all the equipment when recording the film.
“It is a pivotal moment for Argentine cinema, too… we were just talking about it with the cameraman and the team – that we met them after so many years – that we were aware that we were doing something good, we had a lot of commitment and we were very young because I thought: ‘Imanol was a child, now that I see photos from that time; I was a baby and I say that that could be my granddaughter today, how could we have had so much responsibility? How did we give everything to each scene. ‘What was there to give when they were so young?'” recalled the film, theater and television interpreter.
“There was always the small question about María Luisa Bemberg, over time what emerges is a woman who is above the film, above us, above its conception… there was a filmmaker and a woman with a commitment that not only “It was a commitment to make, but with an ideological commitment to women, to history and to cinema, which was shocking,” Arias added, praising the work of the Argentine director Mara Luisa Bemberg, who died on May 7. 1995 in Buenos Aires.
Another determining factor that marked the success of Camila falls on the script, which was in charge of Bemberg along with Beda Docampo Feijo and Juan Bautista Stagnaro.
“The script was excellent. I came from reading many scripts and making adaptations because I was making a program… the script when you read it was all there. You had to risk everything to do it all so young…”, Sus Pecoraro stated.
Plot of Camila
The film recreates the true story of the romance between Camila O’Gorman (Sus Pecoraro) and the priest Ladislao Gutirrez (Imanol Arias), during the government of Juan Manuel de Rosas in Buenos Aires, in the first half of the 19th century.
Camila begins to experience a feeling of affection for Father Ladislao, and to show more and more interest in him. At first he rejects her, following the mandate of celibacy imposed by the Catholic Church. But he ends up giving in to his passions and finally, in a scene in the bell tower, he confesses his love for Camila.
They both decide to escape, and take refuge in the town of Goya, in the province of Corrientes, taking false names (Ladislao Gutirrez adopted the name Mximo Brandier, and Camila OGorman called herself Valentina Desn). There they dedicate themselves to being teachers in a rural school.
On the occasion of an event to which they are invited, they are discovered by a priest who knows Ladislao. An inhabitant of the town where they were hiding, in charge of security, offers them a horse and provisions so that they can escape before dawn, when he will have no choice but to arrest them. Camila waits impatiently for Ladislao’s arrival to escape before dawn, but Ladislao – full of guilt – takes refuge in a church between prayers and tears. He finally returns at dawn, when his fate is already signed: both are arrested and imprisoned separately.
