Pere Portabella: “No, I can’t explain the film because I have no arguments to do so.”

The Catalan filmaker presents his lastest film, “The Silence Before Bach”, a work with Bach’s music as background, at the Venice Film Festival outside the competition.

EFE - Sept. 7, 2007

The director, Pere Portabella, presented his film “The Silence Before Bach” at the 64th Venice Film Festival yesterday, a work with Johann Sebastian Bach’s music as the background.  Presented in the official Horizons section that is dedicated to innovative cinematographic languages, the film shows us images linking a truckdriver who plays Bach (interpreted by Alex Brendemühl) with a piano salesman (Feodor Atkine), Bach himself (Christian Brembeck) and the musician Felix Mendelssohn (Daniel Ligorio).

These parts, played by actors, alternate with Bach’s music sung by children’s choirs or played by musicians in the most diverse settings, such as a subway car or a piano store.

The film “has no explanation.  You sit in front of the screen and if it doesn’t work for you, you get up and leave, no problem, it is a legitimate reaction,” but “I can’t explain the film because I have no arguments to do so.  I have no ending or any idea, I am not  following an anecdote...  Therefore, it is impossible for me to explain”,  said Portabella when asked about the significance of the film.

It is like a Rothko painting, for example” he added, during an interview with a small group of reporters.  The Catalan filmaker was born in 1927 and is the author of Warsaw Bridge (1990), The Dinner (1974) and Vampir-Cuadecuc (1970), among other films.

“It has nothing to do with understanding the film.”

“If it doesn’t work for you and you don’t like it at all, that’s fine.  Each person must fulfill his own needs.  If you haven’t understood anything, and you don’t know whether it is fiction or not...” he continued saying.

“For example, on a chess board , I don’t know how to play, but I admire the beauty of the moves.  Why do I find this beautiful?  Explain the rules to me... I just don’t know”, stated Portabella.

“And another thing.  In commercial films that we apparently think we understand, what you recognize is what is happening, which has nothing to do with understanding the film”, he specified.

Take for example “in Bergman where in a marriage conflict you will know what it is but you probably won’t understand it” because the problem you have “understanding me is the same as with Bergman.  I am telling you this affectionately”, he clarified.

“There is something else that is very clear to me.  No one should ever have to worry about what the author wanted to say when you are looking at a painting, reading a book or watching a film.  Never.  It doesn’t matter a bit.  It’s what happens to you.  What conclusions you come to, if it works for you or entertains you or whether you enjoy it...great!  If it doesn’t, then forget it”, he added.

In regard to what his aim was in making this film, he summarized by saying “I had an objective – making the film”.

This work by the Catalan production company, Films 59, will premier on the 26th of September for the opening of the retrospective exhibit of Portabella’s film works in the Modern Art Museum of New York where Die Stille vor Bach will be presented by the director, Jonathan Demme.

Portabella, who has also had exhibits in other museums such as the Pompidou Center in Paris and the Contemporary Art Museum of Barcelona, has produced films by well known authors such as Carlos Saura (Los Golfos), Marco Ferreri (El Cochecito), Luis Buñuel (Viridiana) and José Luis Guerín (Tren de Sombras).  The latter competes this year for the Golden Lion with his film En la Ciudad de Sylvia.