White Elephant (Elefante Blanco)

White Elephant (Elefante Blanco)

Shown as part of the London Film Festival

No date scheduled for UK release

In the heart of Buenos Aires is what should have become the largest single hospital in Latin American. A vast concrete and brick shell that was never finished, the building, (known as the Elefante Blanco - White Elephant) has become part of the local slum, surrounded by a shanty town, populated by drug dealers, the poor and the alienated, filled with filth and violence. It is the story of this urban anachronism that features in Pablo Trapero’s latest movie.

The picture’s action focuses on the work of a Catholic mission, led by Father Julian (Ricardo Darin) and its effort to complete a new housing project in the middle of the slum. His health failing Father Julian brings into this hell his friend Father Nicholas (Jeremie Renier) who is haunted by his inability to protect villagers while working in the Amazon jungle. 

The priests are confronted by appalling weather, dire public health conditions, state complacency, endemic violence and drug dealing that is spiralling out of control.

With an undeviating focus on the awful conditions faced by Argentina’s poor, White Elephant documents their effort to bring some humanity to this environment through a campaign for better living conditions and more involvement from a government and Church hierarchy that would rather keep the problem at arms length.

Belgian and an outsider, Fr Nicholas struggles to retain his distance from the plight of the people he works with. Despite warnings Nicholas becomes increasingly involved, not just with the people and their struggle with violence and drugs, but with Luciana (Martina Gusman), a social worker devoted to the same project.
Trapero’s movie is unswerving in its effort to shine a light on the deprivation that afflicts many of his countrymen. One of the country’s most watched movies of all time, White Elephant has proved highly controversial in Argentina where it has provoked intense debate about the country’s poor.

More interestingly, the position of the priests illustrates the moral complexity faced by those who would do something about it. Fr Nicholas has his vows and faith challenged by involvement in the slums. Fr Julian, the guardian of the mission’s rules of engagement, is challenged in the most extreme manner. In his effort to keep the mission’s distance from violence he is tragically swamped by it.

Trapero’s film is dramatic, cinematic and at times almost overwhelming in its portrayal of the destitution that confronts Argentina’s policy makers. His actors deliver moving performances. As usual Darin is outstanding as an voice of authority who is both devoted and at times appalled by his own work (He was monumental in the Secret In their Eyes, 2009). Renier is a natural and acts here in Spanish even though he speaks not a single word.

But, oddly for a film about the destructive nature of poverty, the action remains firmly with the priests and the social worker. It is their struggle and their inner lives that are played out. None of the poor and the destitute feature here figure as lead characters - only support.

In one sense this is not an issue - the troubles of the priests are engrossing. And yet for a film about poverty one wonders why those forced to live in the slum are not foregrounded more. 

That said it is up to Trapero to decide what his subject is. But it does mean that what we are really seeing is a film about priests and their own ethical struggles. With Fr Julian and Nicholas both from well-off families it’s almost as if the film is saying: look at what poverty and the poor do to everyone else. But I think the movie is aiming at more than that. At one point Luciana remarks that Fr Nicholas can “afford to be poor”. That’s a line that cuts deep. Her accusation is, of course, that the wealthy can afford to get involved and then walk away. They never really have to commit themselves absolutely. Of course, in the end both Julian and Nicholas are utterly committed, like it or not. And that I think, is Trapero’s point about his country’s poverty - like it or not the futures of both rich and poor are intertwined, you can’t keep you distance. 

ends

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