''Earthquake in Chile'' (german: Das Erdbeben in Chili) is a

1975 It was also declared the ''International Women's Year'' by the United Nations and the European Architectural Heritage Year by the Council of Europe. Events January * January 1 - Watergate scandal (United States): John N. Mitchell, H. R. ...

West German West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super-g ...

directed by

Helma Sanders-Brahms Helma Sanders-Brahms (20 November 1940 – 27 May 2014) was a German film director, screenwriter and producer. Biography Helma Sanders was born on 20 November 1940 in Emden, Germany. She attended a school for acting in Hannover from 1960 to 1 ...

. The film is an adaptation of the

Heinrich von Kleist Bernd Heinrich Wilhelm von Kleist (18 October 177721 November 1811) was a German poet, dramatist, novelist, short story writer and journalist. His best known works are the theatre plays '' Das Käthchen von Heilbronn'', ''The Broken Jug'', ''Amph ...

novella ''

The Earthquake in Chile ''The Earthquake in Chile'' (german: Das Erdbeben in Chili) is a short story written by Heinrich von Kleist (1777–1811) and published in 1807. The story's central characters are two lovers caught up in the chaos of the 1647 Santiago earthquake in ...

''.

Plot

Handsome Jeronimo Rugera is hired to tutor the rich heiress, Josephe Asteron. They fall in love, yet the

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * Chris ...

forbids their relationship, and Josephe is hidden in a convent. When the church discovers she is pregnant, Josephe is sentenced to death by

decapitation Decapitation or beheading is the total separation of the head from the body. Such an injury is invariably fatal to humans and most other animals, since it deprives the brain of oxygenated blood, while all other organs are deprived of the i ...

. Jeronimo tracks her down, yet is jailed before he can rescue her. When fate intervenes in the form of a massive earthquake, the two lovers have no idea what is in store for them. Sanders-Brahms uses a voice-over of the first and final sentences of the book, placing them at the beginning and end of the film.

Analysis

According to critic Elaine Martin, author of the scholarly article "Rewrites and Remakes: Screen Adaptations of Romantic Works," the film director "erases the uncanny aspect of Kleist's tale and replaces it with a socio-political explanation" and intended to politicize the earthquake narrative's context in a higher degree compared to the original work. For the adaptation Sanders-Brahms uses parallel plotlines that intersect in the end instead of the flashbacks used in the original work. Sanders-Brahms created story segments referred to by Martin as "pre-stories, as it were."Martin, p
671
Martin states that the new segments "locate" the characters "socially and temperamentally." In addition Sanders-Brahms removed the nineteenth century Prussia context, what Martin calls "the stage that represents Kleist's narrative filter." The author added that the ending of the film is "less sanguine" compared to the novella because the director added a "veiled reference" to the "economic value" of the surviving child. The child is scheduled to inherit the wealth of the parents, who are dead. She further wrote that in the film Don Fernando is "a coolly calculating businessman, shaped by a bourgeois business mentality" instead of a "divine hero."

Cast

*Julia Peña as Josephe Asteron (German voice: Maddalena Kerrh) *Victor Alcázar as Jeronimo Rugera (German voice: Fred Maire) *Juan Amigo as Don Fernando Ormez (German voice: Manfred Schott) *María Jesús Hoyos as Dona Elvira Ormez (German voice: Lis Kertelge) *María Vico as Dona Elisabeth Ormez (German voice: Helga Trümper) *Antonio Gamero as Shoemaker Pedrillo (German voice: Bruno W. Pantel) *

Raquel Rodrigo Raquel Rodrigo (1915–2004) was a Cuban actress and singer who appeared in Spanish films. In 1935, she appeared in the music film ''Paloma Fair ''Paloma Fair'' (Spanish: ''La verbena de la Paloma'') is a 1935 Spanish musical film directed by Ben ...

as Shoemaker Pedrillo's Wife (German voice:

Marianne Wischmann Marianne Wischmann (1921–2009) was a German film and television actress, as well as a renowned voice actress. Selected filmography * ''Third from the Right'' (1950) * '' The Lie'' (1950) * '' Abundance of Life'' (1950) * ''Miracles Still Happ ...

) *Antonio Requena as Barber (German voice: Mogens von Gadow) *

Ángel Álvarez Ángel Álvarez (26 September 1906 – 13 December 1983) was a prolific Spanish film actor. He made over 205 film appearances between 1945 and 1982. He is probably best known for his western films of the 1960s and 1970s. He appeared in Spaghe ...

as Bishop (German voice: Erik Jelde) *José Villasante as Familiar (German voice: Alois Maria Giani) *Miguel Angel Andes as Dominican (German voice: Rüdiger Bahr) *Fernando Villena as Don Henrico Asteron (German voice:

Wolf Ackva Wolf Ackva (30 July 1911 – 16 January 2000) was a German actor. He appeared in more than 70 films and television shows between 1935 and 1996. Selected filmography References External links * 1911 births 2000 deaths People from ...

) *

Marisa Porcel María Luisa Porcel Montijano (15 November 1943 – 15 August 2018) was a Spanish stage, film and television actress. Selected filmography * '' The Garden of Delights'' (1970) * ''Habla, mudita'' (1973) * ''Spanish Fly'' (1975) * ''Black Litter ...

as Warden's Wife (German voice: Emely Reuer) *

Fernando Sánchez Polack Fernando Sánchez Polack (11 August 1920 – 24 January 1982) was a Spanish actor. He appeared in more than 110 films and television shows between 1959 and 1982, mostly of them as a supporting character in Spaghetti Western films. He starred ...

as Warden (German voice:

Norbert Gastell Norbert Gastell (14 October 1929 – 26 November 2015) was a German actor who specialized in Dubbing (filmmaking), dubbing. He was born to German parents, but grew up in Argentina. He moved to Munich in 1938. Gastell was best known in Germany a ...

) *Francisco Ortuño as Mestizo (German voice: Fred Klaus) *María de la Riva as Indian Woman (German voice: Lisa Helwig)

Release

The film was released on

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...

Facets Multi-Media Facets Multi-Media founded in 1975, is a non-profit, 501(C)3 organization, and a leading national media arts organization. Its mission is to preserve, present, distribute, and educate about film. Besides its facilities at 1517 W. Fullerton Ave., Ch ...

in 2009.

Reception

Film critic Greg Titian wrote a generally negative review of the film in which he stated that "''Earthquake in Chile'' throws the audience into the story with scant setup. Narration at the opening sets the scene in a way that was dissatisfying to this reviewer ..I felt that ''Earthquake in Chile'' made emotional demands on the audience without properly establishing an emotional attachment in the audience to those characters ..Perhaps I missed the point, or the historical significance of this particular piece of German cinema, but the predictable storyline, in my estimation, ultimately falls a bit flat," though he nevertheless praised the fact that the "DVD sports a very high quality transfer." ''

Der Spiegel ''Der Spiegel'' (, lit. ''"The Mirror"'') is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. With a weekly circulation of 695,100 copies, it was the largest such publication in Europe in 2011. It was founded in 1947 by John Seymour Chaloner ...

s critic Siegfried Schober's review made similar negative remarks.

Legacy

The director made the 1977 film ' because, during work on ''Earthquake in Chile'', she developed an interest in the work's original author.

References

Bibliography

*Martin, Elaine. "Rewrites and Remakes: Screen Adaptations of Romantic Works." In: Gillespie, Gerald, Manfred Engel, and Bernard Dieterle (editors). ''Romantic Prose Fiction''.

John Benjamins Publishing Company John Benjamins Publishing Company is an independent academic publisher in social sciences and humanities with its head office in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The company was founded in the 1960s by John and Claire Benjamins and is currently managed ...

, 2008, p. 664ff. , 9789027234568.

External links

* * *
''Das Erdbeben in Chili''
at Film Portal {{Helma Sanders-Brahms 1970s historical drama films 1975 television films 1975 films Films about capital punishment Films about Catholicism Films based on short fiction Films based on works by Heinrich von Kleist Films directed by Helma Sanders-Brahms Films set in Chile Films set in prison Films set in the 1640s Films shot in Spain German historical drama films 1970s German-language films German-language television shows German drama television films 1970s pregnancy films Television films based on short fiction West German films German pregnancy films 1970s German films ZDF original programming