The power of stories about the Latin American boom doesn't stop there. Its appeal and influence on words have transcended linguistic boundaries but also artistic disciplines. Soon several filmmakers wanted to bring her to the screen. The first of them, Luis Buñuel, who failed to create a project with the authors of that generation and others who inspired him, but who took them very seriously.
In Buñuel's case, the attraction was twofold. “For us he was the living truth,” said Álvaro Mutis. They also wanted the maestro to adapt them to the screen, starting with Gabriel García Márquez, who gave them his own script called “It's so easy even men can do it” when they were both living in Mexico. Don Luis declined the offer, even though Gabo adored him. This did not happen with “Las ménades”, a story by Julio Cortázar included in the final volume of the game, which Buñuel wanted to do. Also with “The Place Without Borders”, the novel by José Donoso, and with “Pedro Páramo” by Juan Rulfo, a copy of which he scribbled and underlined, with the idea of processing them into images, as Javier Herrera has examined.
This old dream of Buñuel is now realized by Netflix in a feature film directed by Rodrigo Prieto and written by Mateo Gil. It is one of the platform's star projects for 2024 in Latin America: a territory where the brand is currently developing 50 projects.
Natalia Oreiro (in the role of Eva Perón) Ernesto Alterio, in a still from “Santa Evita”.Disney
The novel Buñuel chose from Donoso was eventually adapted by Arturo Ripstein. “The Colonel Has No One to Write to Him” by García Márquez was also filmed here. In the eighties, nineties and early 2000s, numerous other films were made by Latin American authors that were part of the boom. Hollywood was interested in Old Gringo by Carlos Fuentes, directed by Luis Puenzo and starring Gregory Peck and Jane Fonda, and The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende was adapted by Bille August with another spectacular cast, including Meryl Streep stood out. , Jeremy Irons or Antonio Banderas. In Peru, Pantaleón and the Visitors was tackled by Mario Vargas Llosa, adapted twice by Francisco Lombardi, once in 1977 and once in 1999. This director also made “The City and the Dogs” in 1985, while Luis Llosa was busy with La Fiesta del Chivo , together with Isabella Rossellini, in 2005.
The feature film was a crucial film format for multiplying the fabulous effects of this seminal generation of writers. But the 21st century is also adopting it in the audiovisual star format: the television series. “The Boom” is characterized not only by its stories, but also by the characters who gave it more life and played the main roles in it.
García Márquez has an advantage over the others. His son Rodrigo García Barcha is a master of audiovisual art. Both in series and in films. In Hollywood he is not known as Gabo's son, but the other way around. Nobel is identified as Rodrigo's father. García Barcha played a key role in series such as “The Sopranos” and “Six Feet Under” and adapted “Enterapia”, an original work by Israeli Hagai Levi, for the North American version. He triumphed with films such as “Things I'd Say Just by Looking at Her”, “Mother and Daughter” and “Albert Nobbs” with Glenn Close.
Director Rodrigo Garcia. Alejandro Lopez Pineda (Netflix
But for a decade now he has decided to move away from the more Anglo-Saxon stories and concentrate on Latin stories. In 2020, Netflix announced that it would adapt One Hundred Years of Solitude under the supervision and approval of Rodrigo García. The Nobel family only set one condition: the film should be shot in Colombia and in Spanish. In doing so, the heirs broke a taboo. Apparently her father didn't want her to move into films and rejected some suggestions during her lifetime that came from established names like Anthony Quinn. Currently, the series is filmed in the South American country, mainly in Tolima, directed by Álex García López, whose works include The Witcher and Utopia, along with Laura Mora, author of Matar a Jesús or Los reyes del mundo. The scripts were written by José Rivera, Natalia Santa, Camila Brugés and Albatros González.
Those of the boom are now also of interest as a fictional subject. There are two other projects surrounding the most important phenomenon of Hispanic culture in the second half of the 20th century. One will cause as much or more controversy than the book caused. This is Jaime Bayly's The Geniuses, adapted by production company Brutal Media. The work tells of the disagreement between García Márquez and Mario Vargas Llosa. An almost brotherly friendship that fell apart in 1976 when the Spanish-Peruvian Nobel laureate beat the Colombian Nobel laureate.
Another series to come has to do with the agent of both and other authors of the boom: Carmen Balcells. The protagonist will be Carmen Machi and the director will be Óscar Pedraza. The title is “The Boom Agency.” The 20th century belonged to all of these authors in terms of literature. Almost all of them are still valid in the 21st century, largely thanks to the power of screens.
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