The feature film by Luis López Carrasco that precedes The year of the discovery was titled (or titled, in the present) The future , although in reality it passed in a strange past. The director's strategy was to reproduce the Spanish 80s as if, suddenly, they emerged from a completely intact space-time loop . The spectator was faced with a rare phantasmagoria that for some (the oldest) was a strange memory, and for others (the most tender), an equally alien fiction. And yet, completely own and, in both cases, recognizable. It was a document with the same urgency as fabulation; It was dream and hard reality. And that, in short, was the game: to turn the screen on the surface of a timeless mirror that reflected the expired aspirations of some or the sad illusions of others. The present was the past and the two together, the promise of a hard future.
That movie reproduced and invented a kind of party between new bodies and drugs where conversations broke. The famous move was hinted at and, more relevant, its fractures and impostures were accurately described. They were old wounds that, indeed, were also new. Now, the director uses a similar artifact, but much more perfected, ambitious and clairvoyant. We return to the past. This time to the 90s in general and to 1992, very particularly. We talked about the year of the Seville Expo and the Barcelona Olympic Games; We talked about that transcendental and fateful moment in which Spain dreamed different, modern, premiere. That out. However, something more inside, in Cartagena, for example, the reflection of that splendor came transformed into a nightmare in the form and fury of an always delayed industrial reconversion. Suddenly, on February 3, from the Cartagena Parliament flames of anger, rage, frustration and fear erupted.
The film, which is presented today at the Rotterdam Festival (the only Spanish contest), recalls that time while reconstructing and making sense. It is past, we said, but perfectly present that predicts a painful and perfect future. Everything takes place inside a bar where conversations intersect. Older people talk about what was once a glorious and factory city of shipyards, chemical industry and full employment. The names of Bazán, Peñarroya and Fesa-Enfersa sound so familiar that more characters would be said within the film. The least make their parents' memories their own without understanding exactly the meaning of the ruins around them. And all together explain with a rare precision each of the crises (there are many) that currently occur. The screen is split in two in a panoramic diorama and the multiplicity of images and voices embrace the viewer until they become part of the film, interlocutor and victim. Also, if only a little, guilty. What emerges is a prodigy: the most surprising and even essential documentary (that is) that Spanish cinema has given in a long time. An authentic and superb event.
"Although I was born in Murcia, I spent a lot of time in my childhood at my grandparents' house in Cartagena," says the director who was previously a pillar of the euphoric-experimental collective Los Hijos as a justification. «I remember the images, I have them recorded, of the burning autonomous Parliament. And yet, when I recently commented on it, nobody remembered. My parents even thought I was making it up. Maybe there, in that widespread oblivion, is the origin of the tape, ”he continues. In fact, as early as 1992, especially in 1992, no one paid attention to the social conflict unleashed by industrial dismantling as a result of the general delay in taking the measures required by the oil crisis of the 1970s and, very In particular, the incorporation of Spain into the European Union. What mattered was to amaze everyone. «The general attitude of the country was that of the poor who, at one point, has to hide his misery to impress the rich relative. There was a work of oblivion almost conscious , ”adds López Carrasco.
The movie starts with the description of a dream. Raúl Liarte, screenwriter with the director besides himself born in Cartagena, describes the walk through a city flooded with fog next to a German shepherd. And from there, from the closest thing to a premonition already accomplished, conversations and memories are interwoven. "In 92 many things are defined in present-day Spain," says Dr. Carrasco. And he continues: «The culture of the ball, real estate speculation, sports macro events to attract capital flows . The Maastrich Treaty is also signed. And the funny thing is that everything is born there and, in its own way, is still there.
In The Year of Discovery , absolutely everyone is heard: those who participated directly in all the conflicts of that time and those who suffered and suffer the consequences even more directly. Alongside trade unionists such as José Ibarra or Paco Segura, a tight tapestry of more or less recognizable voices, more or less anonymous are discovering the ultimate and profound meaning of almost everything. Filmed with video of the time, the interviewees, who are also necessarily protagonists, play dress up as if they were still in the 90's. Just a little. The camera only leaves the bar where the action is placed through the archive images. The effect achieved is at least immersive, almost carnal. The image covers everything: be the same space of representation where the viewer is as the time itself.
«The surprising thing is that many of the arguments that arise in the interviews were not prepared. The memory of the repression of Francoism or the mimetic reproduction of many of the arguments of the far right to now came out in the conversation without waiting for them. And that says a lot about us and what happened there, ”says Carrasco while attesting to the breadth of his proposal. After the fiasco of industrial policy, Cartagena that voted socialist ended up, perhaps out of rage, in the arms of the PP. And so in the last 25 years. Until in the last elections it is Vox who obtained the most votes. «It is difficult to find a single cause. In the film there are hardly any indications. There are many reasons. On the one hand, there is the disaffection that does not vote to the left. On the other, there is the effect of certain Catholic fundamentalist sectors that are very present both in the university and in the institutions. And finally, the agri-food sector maintains an intact caciquil structure in the area. The business model of the garden is based on total deregulation, very much in tune with the ultra-liberalism of the extreme right, which benefits from the low salaries of immigration completely without labor rights of any kind. Then, in addition, the entire territory is completely abandoned. Both transport and infrastructure are non-existent with very high unemployment rates and completely left slums. The vote to the extreme right has a lot of fatigue, protest, anger and punishment. It is clear.
The future adheres to the story of celebration and glory that time and propaganda wanted to give to the 80. Even if it is to establish a thorough criticism. Those who see there are young people from the middle classes who wake up to what was generically called freedom. The year of the discovery reminds us that there was another Spain of confrontation, reconversion and misunderstanding , and that Spain is what it is and probably will be. Past, present and future.
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