EL SALVADOR: Film on Archbishop Romero Still Banned
SAN SALVADOR, Nov 13 (IPS) - Officials of the Roman Catholic Church joined intellectuals in San Salvador this week in paying tribute to Puerto Rican actor Raul Julia, who died last month, best known for his portrayal of assassinated Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero.
But the film 'Romero', on the life of the Archbishop who was shot and killed in March 1980, remains on the banned list in this country - five years after it was released elsewhere.
Shortly before the civil war ended in El Salvador in Jan. 1992 with the signing of U.N. brokered peace agreements, Orrego Candray, head of the Interior Ministry's Public Entertainment Office, slapped a ban on cinemas showing 'Romero'.
By way of justification, Candray said that the film "did not contribute to the peace process."
Raul Julia, who participated as an observer in El Salvador's first post-war election last March, hoped to take advantage of the occasion to get get the film screened in leading theatres. But the government refused to change its stance.
'Romero', however, has been shown privately at the Jesuit-run Central American University.
The movie is based on a script written by John Sacret Young and was directed by John Duigan. The Catholic Church of the United States sponsored the production.
After Julias's death in New York in late October, the current Archbishop of San Salvador, Arturo Rivera, said "the time has come" for the film to be shown in El Salvador.
In the film, the founder of the ruling Nationalist Republican Alliance Party (Arena), Roberto D'Aubuisson, is portrayed as the founder of El Salvador's "death squads", and as the brain behind numerous cases of torture, summary killings and "disappearances" during the country's 12 years of civil war.
Raul Julia has worked in many other films, including 'The Kiss of the Spider Woman', based on the novel by Manuel Puig of Argentina and 'The Addams Family'. Both films were shown in El Salvador.
The versatile actor played a variety of roles, from drama to comedy.
Actor, writer and college professor Francisco Andres Escobar eulogised the Puerto Rican actor, seen by many as a symbol of the niche carved out by Latin American artists in the U.S. film industry.
Film critic Carlos Cerna recalled that, during his visit to El Salvador seven months ago, Julia had acknowledged Monsignor Romero as his "source of inspiration." (MORE)
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