Canoa: A Shameful Memory

The 1960s were a turbulent time around the world, and the social upheaval and social shocks that rocked the United States -- from hippies burning draft cards to National Guardsmen opening fire on students at Kent State -- were emblematic of challenges, and changes, that affected nations or than our own.

Even so, Felipe Cazals' 1976 film "Canoa: A Shameful Memory" documents a particularly frightening and instructive episode. In September 1968, a small group of young men -- five in all, employees of the Autonomous University of Puebla -- ventured to the nearby town of San Miguel Canoa with the idea of climbing an extinct volcano named La Malinche. Their progress was stalled by pouring rain, and their arrival greeted with hostility and suspicion. Unbeknownst to the group, the townspeople had been led to believe that university students were preparing to invade the town, raise "communist" flags at the church, steal livestock and other possessions, and force the people to abandon their religion. In a blend of panic and fury, the townspeople formed a mob and attacked the group, killing several of them.

Of all the disquieting elements to the story, the most shocking might be that the epicenter of the paranoia and fear was the village priest (Enrique Lucero). His sermons, as depicted in the film, resemble tweets and press conferences by Donald Trump, full of wild accusations and promises that he, and he alone, is a friend to the common man. At the same time, the town has become deeply divided, split between the priest's supporters -- who believe everything he says with an abandon bordering on religious fervor -- and his critics, who view the priest's habit of levying fees on the villagers with resentment and disdain. Those divisions are worsened by a sound system that partisans use to attack and mock each other, sometimes singling individuals out for public humiliation.

The attack on the university employees took place in the midst of other disruptions, including the Tlatelolco Massacre, an infamous clash between students and the combined forces of the Mexican military and police force in Mexico City that took place about two weeks after the incident at Canoa. The massacre was part of the Mexican government's so-called "dirty war" against domestic dissent, which was carried out in part to prevent Mexico being embarrassed on the world stage as it hosted the 1968 Olympics.

Screenwriter Tom�s P�rez Turrent may have been using the violence at San Miguel Canoa as a comment for Mexico's larger problems; his script was seen as being a critique of the repressive regime of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, and an oblique reference to the massacre at Tlatelolco. Guillermo del Toro talks about this in an introduction to the film recorded for the Criterion Collection release of the film in a 4K transfer supervised by the director himself. In another special feature, Mexican filmmaker Alfonso Cuar�n ("Y tu mam� tambi�n," "Children of Men," "Gravity") -- who acknowledges being influenced by "Canoa" -- conducts a conversation with Cazals about the film's semi-documentary style, its impact, and the way it encompasses several genres, from socio-political drama to horror-suspense thriller. Newly translated subtitles preserve the film's deliberately vernacular dialogue (including the passages in which the audience is directly addressed by a townsman who serves as a sort of Vergil to our descent into this particular Inferno).

An essay by Mexican film writer Fernanda Sol�rzano (translated Deborah Wassertzug) outlines the movie in ways that pin it smack-dab onto today's troubled times, when autocrats still use fear as a weapon to consolidate their power, demonstrate their political strength, and insulate themselves from the repercussions of their own malfeasance. It's cold comfort to know that today's worries and outrages are far from new, and anything but unique. As a film, "Canoa" is required viewing for its sheer cinematic skill and storytelling verve; as a document, it resonates now as never before.

"Canoa: A Shameful Memory"
Blu-ray
$31.96
https://www.criterion.com/films/29050-canoa-a-shameful-memory