Jorge Sanjinés

Sanjines made his first feature film, And So It Is (1966), under the auspices of the Bolivian Film Institute, of which he was named director in 1965. A landmark in the history of Bolivian cinema, Ukamau is a sympathetic depiction of the social problems of the Andean peasantry shot exclusively in Aymara, an indigenous language. Because of the controversy surrounding the film, Sanjines was fired from his post, but went on to become one of the most successful of Latin America's leftist filmmakers. Sanjines has attempted to forge a genuinely popular cinema capable of presenting a revolutionary political agenda in a form accessible to working-class and peasant audiences. His most famous feature, the controversial Blood of the Condor (1969), is an impassioned defense of Bolivia's Indian cultures and an attack on US imperialism (symbolized by a covert sterilization program). The nonfiction film The Night of San Juan (1971) features a documentary reconstruction, enacted by survivors, of the infamous "Night of San Juan" massacre of Bolivian miners. In Jatun auka (1974) (released in Peru), Sanjines worked with members of an Andean peasant community to dramatize the brutal exploitation of the peasantry. Even when he has worked in exile, Sanjines has shown an exceptional ability to make artistically innovative and politically powerful films in spite of low budgets and the difficulties attendant on non-industrial film production in Latin America.