A few weeks before the 2022 Oscars take place, there are several stories that hope to keep the interest of the Academy and take home an award. one of them is Beast, Chilean short film.
the tape, which exposes the crimes of Íngrid Olderöckformer special agent of Augusto Pinochet’s regime of German origin, immerses us in his complicated life, and in his accusations of human rights violations. La República spoke with its director, Hugo Covarrubias, and Contanza Wette, art director, about the complex plot they developed.
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Evil has a name and her name is Íngrid Olderöck
As if it were a game of dolls, Bestia, which was initially born as the idea of a series, was composed in stop motion and took the figure of Íngrid Olderöck, former Carabineros officer, accused of various crimes. One of them was corroborated by Beatriz Bataszew, a former detainee: training dogs to rape and torture women as well as men.
“Seeing the difficulties of making a series, we decided to make a short and use Ingrid’s broken psychology to bring her powerful story to life,” Covarrubias explained.
“There were other names, but they didn’t have the depth or the past of her to achieve an independent plot. We really wanted to review this story,” added Contanza Wette.
With the premiere of Beast in Chile and its subsequent nomination for the 2022 Oscars, collective memory moved in that country and there are several young people who for the first time hear of the crimes of this woman who claimed to be a Nazi in life.
“In the world it is difficult to face dark times in countries. People tend to shy away from and avoid these topics. There was a time in my country where this was not talked about and the new generations did not reflect on what happened. Beast, being animation, served to reach this audience”, shared the filmmaker.
Perhaps one of the most shocking moments of the plot is when Olderöck walks through the Venda Sexy (detention and torture center in Santiago). In the images, she expressionless, initiates her acts with no feelings in sight.
Ingrid’s mind, her faithful ally to avoid justice
As the scenes pass, the viewer learns more about Ingrid, her mind and the relationship she has with her dog, Volodia, trained in real life to attack and rape the prisoners in her care. Also, there is a sequence in his house where it is clear to us that his fragile mind was going to break at any moment.
“The fact that we show Ingrid as a porcelain figure in Beast was because she was a woman who never flinched at her crimes and she was rigid about what she did. Until the end he denied knowing his place of torture and to other torturers”, shares Covarrubias.
His mind was also his ally and what prevented him, in one way or another, from going to jail. After an attack in 1981, where she received a bullet in the head and stomach, Íngrid Olderöck used this fact to argue insanity. After retiring from Carabineros and when the justice summoned her to testify in the La banda sexy case, she was unaware of the events, according to Nancy Guzmán in the book La mujer de los perro, a text that was used as inspiration to create Bestia.
A story for any reality
To understand the short it is not necessary to know Chilean history, the project, as its directors say, was born in order to be universal and to understand that ‘Beasts’ can exist anywhere in the world.
“Through animation we open a window so that all the countries that have experienced similar situations remember that we must talk about what happened. We get each culture to give it its nuances and adapt it to its own identity”, said Wette, art director of Bestia.
A short that doesn’t need dialogue
There are no dialogues in the short. The audience only sees Ingrid expressionless. Of course, the images that take us through her dreams show us spaces where she is face to face with her victims who had the misfortune to meet her.
Likewise, we witness how Íngrid Olderöck breaks down before a reality and a system that betrays her. The best example is Beast’s ending, which exposes her inner emptiness and her fury at seeing that she is no longer useful. The torturer died on March 17, 2001, she was not tried for any crime and she never asked for forgiveness.
Beast Trailer
Beast arrives at the 2022 Oscars in the best short film category. As the director says, it enters with a plot that leads to reflection and social criticism, unlike the other competitors who talk about love, taxidermy, art and even Christmas. The gala will take place on March 27.