. . . . . . . . . .*** Theory and Practice ***

Courtesy of Jorge Ruffinelli

My work has always been shaped by a refusal to separate theory from practice. Each film I've made — from Tire dié, where I had 120 assistants, through Los inundados, where I had nearly 80, to my most recent film, Org, where I had only 1 — has been a film/school. I do not believe in “formal” education; I believe in learning by doing. Theory and practice must go hand in hand. I would say — without bias and without hesitation — that practice has to be the key, with theory as its guide and interpreter. This is the foundation on which the first school of documentary filmmaking in Latin America was built.

I returned from Europe with the idea of founding a film school modeled after the Centro Sperimentale, where directors, actors, cinematographers, scenographers, sound technicians, and so on, would all receive their training — in short, a school that would produce fiction filmmakers. Back in Santa Fe, once I saw the actual conditions of the city and the country, I realized that such a school would be premature. What was needed was a school that would combine the basics of filmmaking with the basics of sociology, history, geography, and politics. Because the real undertaking at hand was a quest for national identity, an identity that had been lost or alienated by a system of economic and political as well as cultural hegemony established by the dominant classes in concert first with Spanish colonizers, later with British investors, and most recently with agents of the United States.

This need to seek out a national identity was what prompted me to pose the problem in strictly documentary terms. It is my belief that the first step to be taken by an aspiring national film industry is to document national reality. And so the Escuela Documental concentrated on developing the three major types of cineasts necessary to the documentary: directors, cinematographers, and producers. The organization of the school evolved day by day, on a hit-or-miss basis, guided by our ongoing self-criticism.

From: Burton, Julianne. Cinema and Social Change in Latin America: Conversations with Filmmakers. Austin, Texas: University of Texas Press, (1986): 2-11. [Used with permission]