Educational Media Reviews Online

In this highly sophisticated and introspective film, world renowned author, scholar, and humans rights activist Ariel Dorfman’s storied career is chronicled. Born in Chile, he lived in the United States until 1954, when his father was deported back to Chile for his radical views during the Red Scare. In Chile, Ariel Dorfman remained in league with politics, and eventually served as cultural advisor to Chilean President Salvador Allende. A good deal of this film is devoted to Dorfman’s fond recollections of Allende’s presidency, and the exuberance of the popular revolution that brought Allende to power. During this time, he wrote piercing condemnations of the United States’ political and societal influences, including targets such as Henry Kissinger and Walt Disney. This documentary gives substantive but concise explorations of his works, including How to Read Donald Duck, which exposes blatant Western capitalist drives.

Dorfman witnessed the Sept. 11, 1973 military coup that ushered in the reign of Pinochet in Chile. Dorfman was persecuted and exiled, but launched numerous pieces of literary vitriol against Pinochet from the United States. During the film, Dorfman revisits the sites of many events and reminisces with friends and colleagues of the time. The group speaks of instances of suppression of the press, torture, and imprisonment. He also makes some brief, but stirring parallels to the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

This is an invaluable piece of work, in which the audience learns the value of democracy and other such lessons from history, from Dorfman’s close associations with the former government. He views the rise and fall of democracy in Chile, and speaks to the need for resistance of tyranny.