María is a 1922 Colombian silent film in black and white, directed by Máximo Calvo Olmedo and Alfredo del Diestro.

It was the first feature-length fiction film made in Colombia, and is an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Jorge Isaacs. It tells the story of the love affair between Efraín, the son of a wealthy hacienda owner, and his first cousin María. While most sources claim that the initiative to produce María came from the Franciscan priest Antonio José Posada, others indicate that the idea came from Alfredo del Diestro. Shooting began in October 1921, and took place in some of the same locations as the novel, including the hacienda El Paraíso. The feature film premiered on October 20, 1922 in Buga and Cali.

The film was at the center of what is considered the first copyright controversy in the Colombian film industry, when the Isaacs family filed a lawsuit against Valley Film, the film's production company, which the latter won. The controversy led to the film being banned by local authorities from screening in several Colombian cities, but the legal case also served as additional publicity for the film, which broke box-office records in Colombia.

It was the only Colombian film at the time to be shown in national cinemas for several years. While the film was a success domestically, it was a failure abroad. The positive reception and commercial success of María gave a boost to Colombian film production, with other producers producing some twenty films during the silent era.

Despite its importance, no copies of the film have survived; only a 25-second fragment has been preserved, along with dozens of stills. A short documentary, En busca de María, was made in 1985 by Luis Ospina and Jorge Nieto, with the aim of retracing the history of the making of María.

Synopsis

The film is an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Jorge Isaacs, which tells the story of the love affair between Efraín and María.. As only a 25-second fragment of the film remains,. the adaptation cannot be sufficiently analyzed, but it is very likely that it is not very different from the literary work.. Indeed, the fact that the novel is a bestseller, and therefore familiar to the public, is supposed to guarantee the film a certain success on its release.

María tells the story of the love affair between Efraín, the son of a wealthy hacienda owner in the Valle del Cauca, who is studying in Bogotá, and his first cousin María. During one of his visits to the hacienda, the young man meets María and the two fall in love. However, Efraín must leave for Europe to complete his education. During his absence, María, who is suffering from a serious illness, dies after a slow agony, still longing for Efraín. When Efraín returns to Colombia, all he is left with is his beloved's grave and a deep sorrow.

Technical data

Original title: María Director: Máximo Calvo Olmedo, Alfredo del Diestro Screenplay: Máximo Calvo Olmedo and Ricardo Nieto, based on the novel María by Jorge Isaacs Photography and editing: Máximo Calvo Olmedo Costumes: Emma Roldán.. Production: Francisco José Posada Line producer: Mario Fernández de Soto. Production company: Valley Film Country of origin: Colombia Format: black & white – silent – 35 mm Running time: feature film (approx. 180 minutes), cut into two parts. Genre: fiction, drama, romance Release date: Colombia: October 20, 1922

Cast

Stella López Pomareda:Depending on the source, the name is spelled Stella or Estela. María, dans . Hernando Sinisterra: Efraín Margarita López Pomareda: Emma, Efraín's sister Juan del Diestro: Efraín's father Emma Roldán: Efraín's mother Ernesto Ruiz: Efraín, as a child Jorge González: José Alfredo del Diestro: Salomón and Don Chomo Ernesto Salcedo: Braulio Francisco Rodríguez: Guao Angel Edy Salospi (pseudonym of Eduardo Salcedo Ospina): Carlos

According to Máximo Calvo, two other actresses, whose names he doesn't recall, also played in María: an Italian, Lucia, as José's wife, and Elvia, from Buga, as Tránsito.

Production

Context and reputation of the adapted novel

In the early 1900s, Colombia's economic boom favored the development of cinema, enabling many films to be imported and several movie theaters to be built, such as Bogotá's Gran Salón Olympia, inaugurated on December 8, 1912.. The Italian Di Domenico brothers moved to Bogotá in 1909,, dans . before setting up the Sociedad Industrial Cinematográfica Latinoamericana (SICLA) in 1913.. This initiative is considered by Colombian film historian Luis Alfredo Álvarez to be "the first organized attempt at a national cinema". The Di Domenico brothers took advantage of the assassination of General Rafael Uribe Uribe on October 15, 1914 to release, a year later, the feature-length film El drama del 15 de octubre,, dans . considered to be the first film documentary made in Colombia. Nevertheless, the scandal that followed its release and the newspaper headlines that described it as an "immoral film" were a stinging failure for the Di Domenico brothers and for the fledgling national film industry. In fact, their avant-garde attempt to attract audiences with a sensitive topical subject brought regular film production to a screeching halt in the years that followed. In 1922, Alfredo del Diestro and Máximo Calvo Olmedo made their first feature-length Colombian fiction film, María.

For the screenplay, they chose to adapt Jorge Isaacs' only novel, María (published in 1867), which has become one of the most notable works of Romanticism in Spanish literature.. Considered one of the masterpieces of Spanish-American literature, María tells several stories of impossible love, the characters belonging to different social classes or ethnic groups, notably that between Efraín and his cousin María. Right from its first edition, the book was a literary success, José Joaquín Ortiz declaring in the newspaper La Caridad, lecturas del hogar that the verses in this volume "were received with rare enthusiasm". María's success was rapid, with editions published in 1870 in Mexico, 1874 in France, 1882 in Spain and 1890 in the United States.

Project origins

Explanations differ as to the origins of the project.

According to most sources,. the idea for the film came from Franciscan priest Antonio José Posada, a Colombian living in Panama at the time. A theater and film buff, he had seen several films by the Spaniard Máximo Calvo Olmedo, including Guerra entre Panamá y Costa Rica. In 1921, he suggested to Calvo, then in Panama, that he make a film based on the novel María by Jorge Isaacs. To this end, he went to the director's photography studio and gave him a copy of the novel, telling him: "Read this wonderful book and study the possibility of making a film out of it".Original quote: "Lea este libro maravilloso y estudie la posibilidad de fumarlo" Despite some initial reluctance, Calvo was eventually enthused by his reading and decided to make an adaptation. On his return to Colombia, he discussed the project with Alfredo del Diestro, who was visiting the Valle del Cauca at the time. They decided to seek funding and the support of solvent members of Vallecaucana society. With the financial help of Federico López, a dentist who had returned from Jamaica, where he was Colombian ambassador, and members of the Salcedo family living in Buga, who joined the venture, the Valley Film production company was founded. Posada also sent money to Calvo for the purchase of equipment, namely 12,000 feet of negatives, 10,000 positives and special paint for the artists' faces and hands.

Other sources suggest another hypothesis. According to two sources at the time, the idea was the brainchild of Alfredo del Diestro, who approached Francesco Di Domenico with a view to bringing it to fruition, but failed to reach an agreement. Moreover, on January 22, 1924, an editor of the newspaper Mundo al Día wrote in the article "Orígenes del Cine Nacional"Literally: "The origins of national cinema". that Alfredo del Diestro had in mind the idea of filming Jorge Isaacs' María and had tried to obtain the support of the company Di Doménico Hermanos & Compañía to carry out this project. However, despite negotiations, no agreement was reached between the two parties. Del Diestro then decided to shoot the film at the hacienda El Paraíso during one of his visits to Cali. To obtain the rights, he then went to Bogotá to meet the Isaacs family, but they demanded $40,000 for the adaptation rights, temporarily dashing hopes of seeing the project through. Shortly afterwards, according to Pedro Moreno Garzón, Secretary General of SICLA, the priest Antonio José Posada, then in Cali, had the same idea as Del Diestro and met him in Buga to work together on a film adaptation of Isaacs' novel. Alfredo del Diestro, who was looking for a director of photography, is said to have tried to secure the services of Vicente Di Domenico, but the latter, who was already busy, recommended Máximo Calvo, with whom he later teamed up to direct María.

On the other hand, there is some controversy as to the authorship of the film's screenplay. According to some sources, it was written either by Alfredo del Diestro or by Ricardo Nieto, a Vallecaucano poet... The latter hypothesis is supported by Esperancita Calvo's testimony in the documentary En busca de María (1985) by Luis Ospina and Jorge Nieto.

The making The lead role of Efraín was initially given to Hernando Domínguez, but he was eventually passed over for Hernando Sinisterra because he had too many demands, earning him the reputation of being the first Colombian film actor.. The character of María was played by Stella López Pomareda (1904–1987), one of the daughters of dentist and ambassador Federico López Pomareda. She had two things in common with the character: she was Jewish and born in Jamaica. Having arrived in Colombia at the age of 17, the actress didn't speak Spanish at the time, but this didn't harm her, as the film was silent. Her sister, Margarita López Pomareda, was also chosen to play Emma, Efraín's sister.

Filming began in October 1921, at the hacienda El Paraíso, the setting for the plot of Jorge Isaacs' novel, although the interior scenes were shot in the municipality of Buga. Some scenes were shot in the same locations as those described in the novel, such as the one showing Efraín crossing the Río Amaime on horseback, a kilometer from the hacienda.

Máximo Calvo used a William and Son camera that Vincenzo Di Domenico had sold him at a good price to thank him for teaching him how to develop film. During the making of the film, he experienced a few technical problems, lacking the necessary elements to film according to his practice and at the level of his mastery of photography, which he nonetheless managed to solve easily. Calvo, who had no technical collaborators at his side, developed the film's negatives in a makeshift laboratory set up in the oratory of the El Paraíso hacienda, before making the first three positive prints in Buga. In a 1960 interview with Hernando Salcedo Silva, Calvo said that shooting María had given him the experience he needed to make a film without the help of "an endless list of technicians".

Film's reception

Film release