Paz Vega (Seville, 1976) remembers that her first experience with the stage was directing a play at school. “And since I said I wanted to be an actress, I also knew that I would end up directing,” she adds. Of course, he has previously spent more than two decades embodying all kinds of characters, and seven years have passed since he conceived his first project until he managed to premiere it in Locarno. For her, it has been worth it: receiving Rita has left the unanimous impression that it is the first step in a promising career as a filmmaker.
The public at the Huelva Ibero-American Film Festival has enjoyed this debut that reflects life in a Sevillian neighborhood in the mid-80s of the last century from a child’s perspective, with domestic violence as a background issue. “For me it is an apolitical story, there is no discourse or Manichaeism of any kind,” he asserts. “I simply wanted to put the focus on something that continues to happen, but that is not usually seen from the point of view of the collateral victims. I have paid attention to them, how they suffer, how they often do not understand what is happening around them, how they defend themselves with their means. I didn’t want to make a grotesque, obvious, or tremendous film. Rita is a story, it has that halo of children who half listen, who see but do not see, and who through their imagination manage to escape.”
Unlike Alfred Hitchcock, who boasted of never working with children or dogs, Paz Vega not only has had no problem working with either, but she is delighted to have done so. “It has been a beautiful journey to be able to work with those three children who are three angels. Sofía, the protagonist, has something, a very beautiful germ to be an actress; He knows this job and has instinctively known how to assimilate it with great intelligence. They are three little ones who have trusted me, have shaken my hand and let themselves go. But you have to choose well, work beforehand, play a lot with them, see how they work together, what energy is created with them.”
Play with emotion
And although the topic addressed is unfortunately of absolute relevance, the choice of those years is more than deliberate. “I wanted to go back to that time, when the Divorce Law was approved, and see how many women are still questioned why they don’t leave home, why they put up with some things… I reflected on how alone they feel and the difficulties with which they collide when they decide to take the step, or the conflicts that single mothers face. And I am also clear that machismo is a transversal issue, which does not include social classes, races or accents.”
His faith that cinema can help raise awareness in this regard is absolute. “In movies we rely on emotion. When you tell something that reaches the viewer from a less rational and more emotional place, the reflection it generates in you is deeper. The insensitivity to the headlines of the press has ended up being tremendous, the dramas are reduced to a statistic, but when you turn it into fiction the impact is greater. It’s not that cinema should have an educational function, for me it is above all entertainment, but if you also help generate a thought and make the person who sees it a better person, it is even more beautiful.”
The transition from acting to directing, although nothing extraordinary, “could be even more common,” he defends. “As actors have a lot to express, we spend a lot of time being directed, adapting to each other’s needs, until there comes a moment when you ask yourself, why not grab the camera and tell something from my perspective?” However, when you take the step “you see that the work, involvement and commitment are greater. “There is a lot of work between the abstract idea and the finished film.”
Prejudices and surprises
When asked which directors, of all those she has worked for, have left the greatest mark on her or influenced her the most, she avoids naming names. “To tell you the truth, I don’t think about anyone in particular. They have all influenced me, for better or worse, in the sense of also showing me what I don’t want to do. But my way of directing has been very intuitive, based on passion, respect for the team and the desire for us all to feel like we are rowing in the same boat at the same time. When you have to get up every day at 5 in the morning, if you think you are going to suffer, it is a terrible thing. I can’t allow that, we have to create a happy and family atmosphere, even if then you find a thousand problems and everything is a continuous race against the clock.”
On the other hand, the excellent reception of Rita on the part of viewers and critics has been accompanied by a general feeling of surprise, as if few expected that Paz Vega could make a product of such sensitivity and depth as this one. “I’ve noticed it, even in some interviews they’ve told me ‘I didn’t expect something like that.’ And what did you expect? That denotes that there were some prejudices weighing on me. Sometimes it’s hard to get rid of them. People thought they knew me, and this film has shown that that is not the case at all. Only my family and my closest circle of friends know me, and the people I work with. The public creates their fantasy, so it has been good and surprising to show another side of me.”
A facet, by the way, that no longer seems to have a turning back, as she herself acknowledges: “I would like this not to be an anecdote, of course. I have another finished script and another idea that crossed my mind like a flash and that I’m already thinking about. I just hope that the next projects don’t have to wait so long.”
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