Z AND STATE OF SEIGE BY COSTA GAVRAS AND THE ART OF MAKING A POLITICAL FILM

I don’t think I’ve seen a film with as many painful blows to the head as those given out in Costa Gavras’s  Z.  Gavras, aside from being one of the best political filmmakers of all time, also tells a great story.  You feel the intimidation applied to the opposition party as they attempt to bring in a speaker on nuclear disarmament only to be met with stonewalling in the form of potential venues canceling under government pressure and the creation of new laws hindering the right to assemble.

You share the sense of helplessness as the military government using secret societies, paramilitary groups bring big gangs of armed thugs to disrupt the talk and eventually kill the speaker by hitting him on the head.

You share the rage at the cover-up that follows – the intimidation of witnesses, the ridiculous story of their version of what happened.

You feel the sense of jubilation at the end when a dogged prosecutor finally runs down those who are guilty indicting the whole junta in the process.

Gavras is also not afraid of indicting America for its Cold War coddling of right-wing dictatorships.  Here the reference point is Gavras’s native Greece and the military dictatorship that ran at America’s behest under the fig leaf of fighting communists.

Gavras tells his story like a documentary filmmaker showing different versions of what happened during a particular event but also making it clear which one is the truth.

STATE OF SEIGE is even more direct in its tale, based on the true story of Dan Mitrione, of a CIA torture specialist in Uruguay (whose cover story is head of a US Aid organization)  kidnapped and interrogated by local guerillas.  The scenes of torture taught to Uruguay’s military dictatorship complete with scenes of electric shocks applied to people’s genitals are powerful because they are not presented dramatically but rather as if this was something real captured on film perhaps by hidden camera.       

SIEGE works because it shows us all the angles as the charming but evil CIA man (well played by Yves Montand who also plays the murdered political leader in Z) gradually breaks down under the probing of his questioner never actually completely confessing but finally stopping the denial of the horrible things he has done.

It is hard to make a good political film with preachiness and ideology getting in the way of a good story.  Gavras filters his narrative through a form of cinema verite that is very story based and very active.  The end result is two great passionate films that also serve to remind us of America’s negative anti- human rights policies during that time.