Felipe Vara de Rey | Independencia (Independence) / 2010

information is power, but don’t tell mama

by Douglas Messerli

 

Hugo Mas and Felipe Vara de Rey (screenplay), Felipe Vara de Rey (director) Independencia (Independence) / 2010 [4 minutes]

 

Two brothers (Antonio de Cos and Hugo Mas) of the 19th century, involved on opposite sides of a war, are sitting in the square discussing the meaning of the enterprise, their local congress, philosophy, and various other topics in this remarkable witty quick comedy by Spanish director Felipe Vara de Rey.

 

     José begins with Rosseau, arguing that “In the future our ages controversies will see just as odd as the past ones look to us.” He tells Jacinto that the way they are fighting is insane. “Debt is going to shoot up and there will be no government able to the fight the budget deficient.” Their fighting, he argues, is just a temporary thing.

     His brother agrees, he sees no value fighting and dying for Spain. What Jacinto does object to, however, is brother’s reading of the Gazette, which “does nothing but drop poison!”

     “But don’t you see that we are in the era of mass communication?” argues the first brother. “The press has transformed the way we understand the world.” Information flows, leaks out to all people of the world. “Jacinto, information is power.”

      Jacinto is of another opinion: “All they do these swine hack writers if fill the Spanish language with foreign words.”

      Miguel argues that “linguistic purity no longer makes any sense. Spelling rules change, languages are contaminated.” We are a global community, he proclaims.

      He returns to Rosseau to make his point that it is ridiculous that the Spaniards of fighting.

      But Jacinto knows better. “This think of yours has nothing to do with war, or with the Frogs,

or with the clumsy fellows in Cádiz or with the bloody Bourbon.” It is because of the bookseller, Ezequiel, Jacinto argues. “The queer.”

    

      José suddenly rises, with his musket at the ready.

      Jacinto continues, however, arguing that Ezequiel has put these ideas into his brother’s head.

      Calming down, José rather sheepishly asks, “Does mother know?’

      “I don’t think so,” Jacinto answers, turn his face away. “Are you going to desert to go with him?”

      José, biting his lower lip, nods his head in assent.  

      “Fuck me and the Poem of the Cid!”

      “I swear, I thought it would be a passing affair,” José admits.

      “We live in times of much lugubriousity,” responds Jacinto has he puts his hand on his brother’s should and in the background Edith Piaf’s "Non, je ne regrette rien."

    Rosseau may have been right about some aspects of war, but if this lovely comic gem is to be believed, many things never change, and we recognize immediately that each generation believes it lives in the saddest of times. War is one thing, but as for love and sex, what can you do about them?

 

Los Angeles, April 21, 2024

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (April 2024).