Week 2
October 13 - 19

 Cuentos de mi niñez
(Tales from My Childhood) (1991)

Directed by Francisca Duran
Chile/Canada, Color, 8:45 mins, 1991

Film in English with Spanish subtitles 

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A short documentary in which the filmmaker recalls childhood memories, accompanied by imagery from present-day Kingston and Toronto, Canada. The memories are sinister and morbid, of nightmares and suicide and dentists; the footage we see of snowy streets, a child playing, and the seaside become foreboding. We learn how Duran escaped from Chile with her family as a six-year old at the time of the 1973 coup and how the death of democracy led to the death of innocence and truth.

"Salvador Allende was elected president of Chile in 1970 and began a series of reforms that included government control of education and health care, the nationalization of copper mining and banking, and a continuation of land redistribution to peasant farmers. His government was overthrown by a CIA-backed coup on the orders of American president Richard Nixon in 1973, and was replaced by the army general Augusto Pinochet. This harsh authoritarian rule resulted in thousands of deaths and systematic torture (including women and children). Duran recounts the historical record against pictures of the childhood she had and never had, the innocence lost and found, and her refugee flight to the safety of far away Canada." - Mike Hoolboom, Franci Duran: The Poetry of Exile.

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The event is free of charge. To register, please send an email to rsvp@sbcgallery.ca with the name of the film or films you wish to see. You will receive a link to access the film on the date of the event.