An analysis of the audiovisual industry made Colombian filmmakers Cristina Gallego, John Bolívar and teacher Fernando Galindo in the conversation ‘Soap operas and movies about vallenato and its world‘, which was held within the framework of the first Valledupar Book Fair, Felva 2023in the House of Municipal Culture.
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During their interventions, the teachers of cinema, television and literature, told the story behind a production and the elements that must be taken into account before deciding to make a film or soap opera, landing the subject on the recordings they have made about Vallenato music or related to the idiosyncrasy of the region.
“When we came to do ‘Los viajes del viento’ we did a search for actors, there were five or six, and they had a particularity, that they should be actors and musicians. We had the advice of Tomás Darío Gutiérrez and we wanted him to play a role and we couldn’t, there was Marciano Martínez, Rosendo Romero and we needed a number of characters that we had to convert from musicians to actors… Vallenato has a very close relationship with the land and we wanted to see their relationship”said the filmmaker Cristina Gallego when recounting the pre-production process in her film ‘Los viajes del viento’, starring the composer Marciano Martínez.
The filmmaker also recounted that to find the protagonist of the story they did more than 800 castings, choosing the Guajiro composer for his relationship with the countryside and the Vallenato minstrels, thereby highlighting the role of natural actors, who are trained in the training phase of an audiovisual production.
“I am moved by the scene of the piqueria because there are 15 minutes of music and it seems like a real duel and that is what was in the script, everything that was going to happen, the couplets were produced in training and it is a process of double track that finally takes the viewer. Cinema is very powerful, working with natural actors is a lot of learning”added Cristina Gallego.
In contrast, actor John Bolívar mentioned that a natural actor is one who acts without the need for training, those who play a different role offstage in their personal life and manage to sustain a character in a soap opera or movie.
“I don’t believe in those so-called natural actors because they are actors who undergo training, in the end they end up being root actors. The actor must have training, but there are no schools. The vallenato has actors and we give them a role and they do it well and we have proven it in the series that one wants to play the role of another and they do itBolivar said.
ADAPTATION OF STORIES
Another of the topics analyzed during the conversation was the adaptation of books or novels to movies, series and soap operas, finding that many times they fail to get rid of the stories of the literary work. Notably Series like Leandro, which recounts the life and work of the Guajiro composer Leandro Díaz, was made based on the book, with the same title, by the writer Alonso Sánchez Bautebeing raw material for the audiovisual industry.
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“I think the first argument is to disrespect adaptations because sometimes the story of a novel is adapted and the director says: ‘Either I subordinate myself or I use it as a starting point.’ In Soviet cinema they said that the text was sacred and subordinated the story.
It is essential that literary works and songs reach a greater production for cinema; through the novel ‘Escalona’ I came to vallenato and I had the opportunity to tell the teacher that he was a great poet and I said it because the same series allows one to reach those books”, expressed the teacher Fernando Galindo.
For his part, John Bolívar explained that in terms of narrative and literary adaptations, the process has changed, since before they had to deliver a plot of the story, which ended up being a book, while now they ask for a four-line text.
“Before you were approved of a plot that was a book and even when it was for television they were looking for screenwriters like Daniel Samper Pizano, who wrote the plot of ‘Escalona’, a version was made for television and now they tell us to present something with four lines and that means that we do not respect and do not have the rigor to do the works”, he counted.
Similarly, Cristina Gallego mentioned that it is easier for audiovisual producers to adapt a story to a film than a novelsince in the script they find dialogues, descriptions full of texts and they need to go directly to the central axis of the story so as not to distract the viewer.
CESAR AND LA GUAJIRA AS FILM SET
Finally, the panelists asked for more support from government entities to develop audiovisual stories in the departments of Cesar and La Guajira, since its landscapes make it a privileged setting, and this is also an important factor when it comes to strengthening the economy and the tourism in the region.
“Our only vocation is tourism because the little water we had we ended up with mining and climate change, that’s why We propose that Cesar and La Guajira be a cinematographic set where stories can be told and tourism promoted”said John Bolivar.
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It should be noted that in Cesar and La Guajira the telenovelas ‘Leandro’, ‘La Cacica’, ‘Diomedes Díaz, the Cacique of La Junta’ and the films ‘Los viajes del viento’, ‘Pájaros de verano’ and ‘La frontera’, to mention a few, that although not all of them are about Vallenato music and its world, they are rooted in the culture of the region.
BY: CARMEN LUCIA MENDOZA NECK / EL PILÓN.