I'm Still Here - devastating film on the psychological impact of military dictatorship

I’m Still Here is a devastating film that delves into the experience of people living under military dictatorship in Brazil the 1960’s and 70’s while also resonating in the here and now.

The film focuses on the family of Rubens Paiva, a former Labour party congressman who fled into exile after being removed from congress following the 1964 military coup. The film begins after his return to Brazil and much of the early part of the film depicts his happy middle class family life. The family live by the beach in Rio de Janeiro and spend happy days there with friends. They enjoy sports and games, listen to popular music, go to the cinema, have parties.

But while the family seem happy, in the background, Rubens is in regular contact with the underground left-wing resistance. Rubens and his wife Eunice worry about the future and the safety of their children and ponder whether to go back into exile. Their oldest daughter who is becoming increasingly politically aware is sent away to London to keep her safe. And while the film presents the Paiva’s as a happy, comfortable family, the threat of the military regime is a constant presence with military helicopters flying overhead, trucks on the streets and checkpoints on the roads.

The film turns with Rubens’ arrest by the military police in January 1971. For days afterwards, military police remain in the Paiva’s home while offering no information on Rubens’ whereabouts. Then Eunice and their 15-year-old daughter Eliana are also arrested and brought to military prison for questioning. While Eliana is released after a day, Eunice spends days in the prison as her interrogators demand information on supposed left-wing terrorists. In the background we hear the screams of other prisoners being tortured and see their blood on the floors. To the viewers and Eunice’s horror, we can only speculate if Rubens or Eliana are among those screaming or bleeding.

Eunice is eventually released but with still no information on the whereabouts of her husband. As Eunice searches for answers, she hides her fears to protect her children and continues to project a façade.

The film becomes a harrowing portrayal of how the uncertainty of not knowing whether Rubens is alive or dead becomes a psychological torture worse than the grief of loss. Fernanda Torres who plays Eunice, gives an astonishing performance in conveying this struggle. The film title references Eunice’s persistence in her struggle for answers and for justice. For so many thousands of families in Brazil and across much of South America during this time, this uncertainty continued for decades with no answers. Assuming that their loved ones had been killed but without the closure of knowing for sure or being able to bury them. This taps into experiences felt in so many countries around the world where violent repressive regimes have been or are in power.

And while the film addresses a particularly dark period in Brazilian history, it also speaks to issues today. Much of director Walter Salles earlier work has addressed political themes including his 2004 biopic of a young Ché Guevara, The Motorcycle Diaries. But with his first narrative film in 12 years, Salles clearly wants to draw connections between the historical events of the film and recent and current events in Brazil and around the world. It is not so long ago that Jair Bolsonaro was president of Brazil, a far-right president who openly harked back to the days of military rule. While Bolsonaro was eventually defeated, him and his politics still have support in Brazil. The far-right in Brazil have relentlessly attacked the film while defending the dictatorship. The film however, has been a massive hit in Brazil and the renewed attention the film has brought has pushed the Brazilian authorities to finally legally recognise the violent, unlawful death of Rubens Paiva over 50 years after he was killed, helping to demonstrate the influence that art can have.

Ultimately the film is also a reminder of the challenges for the left when coming up against the machinery of the capitalist state and the measures the state can resort to when it feels threatened. The left cannot rely on just a few good people in parliament, it needs the support and strength of mass movements of people in order to challenge the state and bring about real change.

Mickey 17 - scabrously entertaining film of class struggle

Mickey 17 is the fascinating new film by Korean auteur Bong Joon Ho, following on from the huge success of his 2019 Oscar-winning film Parasite. While carrying many of the same themes as Parasite, Mickey 17 is much larger in scope to go with its significantly bigger Hollywood budget, the biggest Bong has worked with to date.

Mickey 17 follows the story of Mickey Barnes, who together with his business partner Timo join an interplanetary colonising mission to escape murderous debt collectors on Earth. Without reading the fine print, Mickey signs up to be an expendable on board the four-year mission to the planet Niflheim. As Mickey dutifully explains through voiceover, he quickly realises an expendable is there to carry out the most dangerous jobs on board the ship. This includes exposing himself to deadly radiation, testing out vaccines and being fed experimental food and medicines. As an expendable, each time Mickey dies, his body is reprinted and his memories reimplanted within 24 hours. Mickey 17 thus, is the seventeenth iteration of Mickey Barnes.

Complications ensue however when Mickey 17 is left for dead on the frozen planet Niflheim. He survives and returns to the ship only to find that Mickey 18 has already been printed. The presence of two Mickey Barnes sets up a brilliant dual performance by English actor Robert Pattinson who manages to clearly delineate the two Mickeys with different personalities. Pattinson is best known for his roles in blockbusters such as Twilight and The Batman but has also had a far more interesting career outside the mainstream in works by auteur directors such as David Cronenburg and Claire Denis.

The presence of Mickey 17 and Mickey 18 however violates the strict rules against multiples after the case of a serial killer using multiples of himself to commit murders while escaping justice. If Mickey 17 and Mickey 18 are to coexist, they will have to escape the attentions of the mission’s leader, the failed politician, Kenneth Marshall. Marshall, having been voted out on Earth, decides to colonise Niflheim where he dreams of a perfect world inhabited by a new, white, super-race. Although director Bong Joon Ho has stated that Marshall is not a reference to any particular politician, Kenneth Marshall, as played in a skin-crawling performance by Mark Ruffalo, does seem to combine the genocidal rhetoric of Adolf Hitler with the clownish mannerisms and vanity of Donald Trump. Marshall is accompanied at all times by the Lady Macbeth like figure of his wife Ylfa, played by Toni Collette, who guides him and soothes his ego. There is also a wholly unnecessary side-plot in which Ylfa is on a quest to find the perfect sauce to serve with dinner.

A particularly memorable dinner scene with the Marshalls and Mickey 17, in which Mickey is served steak contrasts sharply with the indistinguishable slop Mickey is accustomed to in the rations. With the mission taking longer than expected and supplies starting to run low, of course as an expendable, Mickey had been subjected to much reduced rations of slop compared to other crew members.

The film does start to fray with a chaotic final act after Kenneth Marshall decides to exterminate the native creatures, so-called creepers, from Niflheim. But it fits in with much of Bong Joon Ho’s work which has often looked at human’s destructive relationship with nature. Indeed, as a film, Mickey 17 brings together so many of the themes explored in his previous works such as Korean language pictures Parasite and The Host as well as his Hollywood co-productions Snowpiercer and Okja.

The overarching theme of Mickey 17 though is class struggle and how workers are treated as expendable under capitalism. Mickey 17 is the extreme example but there is a clear divide in the film between those who do the work on the ship and those who are in control. The film also references the MAGA movement’s slavish devotion to Trump as plenty of people are on the ship because they believe in Kenneth Marshall and will happily follow him to the ends of the universe (literally).

The film has faced some criticism for not focusing more on the ethical questions around reprinting humans, or on Mickeys experience of dying. Characters ask Mickey what it is like to die, and he has no answer. In truth I think there are so many themes and questions in this film, it can be hard to focus on any one of them. Certainly, Mickey 17 as a film is not as sharp or tightly focused as Parasite in its political edge, but it is still fascinating to watch and scabrously funny. And while there have been concerns by film industry insiders that Mickey 17 will not recoup its enormous budget, Bong Joon Ho’s reputation as a brilliant film-maker remains intact.