Macario

His candle flickering low, Macario consults with Death

Roberto Gavaldon's Macario, released in 1960, is a first class fable based on a B. Traven novella. Traven's tale was published in 1950 in German and was based on Mexican folklore. It is also a variant of the Everyman morality plays. The work has been translated into English as "The Third Guest" or "The Healer". The film balances well its supernatural elements with a focus on the plight of the Mexican proletariat, a hallmark of Traven's work whoever he was.

Macario (Ignacio Lopez Tarso) is a rural peasant who is struggling to provide for his family in 18th Century New Spain. Macario gathers wood for the local bakery while his wife, who has no spoken name and is played by Pina Pellicer, helps make ends meet by working as a laundress. They struggle to feed their five children, much less themselves. The film begins as the locals prepare to celebrate the Day of the Dead. Food is laid out as an offering which only heightens Macario and his wife's sense of impoverishment. Fed up, so to speak, Macario vows to go on a hunger strike until he can have a whole roasted turkey to himself.

His wife is so convinced of her husband's resolve that she filches a turkey and roasts it for Macario. Macario takes to the hinterlands to enjoy his repast in peace, but is interrupted by three mysterious figures representing Satan, God, and Death. Each tries to barter with Macario, offering various temptations for half of the turkey. Because of his empathy for Death, who resembles a starving peasant, Macario accepts his bargain. Death gives Macario a healing elixir; with certain conditions, naturally. The first is that Macario will receive only a finite amount of the liquid. Once it's gone, it's gone for good. The second proviso is that the elixir can only be used on certain parties. If Death appears at the foot of the bed of a patient, Macario can administer the magic potion. If Death is at the head of the bed, the patient is doomed and Macario's elixir is of no use. Of course, it is never a good idea to make a deal with Death or Satan and I'm not that sure about God.

Once Macario begins using his healing powers, word begins to spread and his fortune is made. Predictably, wealth does not bring happiness to Macario and his missus. The forces of Western enlightenment band together to stop this obvious charlatan and Macario is arrested and brought before an inquisitorial tribunal. His only hope is to save the life of the Viceroy's ailing son, but Death remains obdurate. It is a tribute to Gavaldon and his collaborators that the film runs true to Traven's fatalism in the concluding reel.

Tarso was distinguished stage actor who went on to be a mainstay of Mexican cinema. Saddled with a goofy wig, Tarso offers a stolidly underplayed performance. He is the static center of the film and Gavaldon wisely constructs the film around him. Tarso's stoic gaze as he sees a turkey being basted is proof positive of the Kuleshov effect. 

Pina Pellicer is a different kettle of fish. Her haunting beauty was used expressively here and in Marlon Brando's One Eyed Jacks which was shot before Macario, but released after, due to Brando's tinkering. Pellicer's face expresses the anguish of their impoverishment as opposed to Tarso's stoic mask. Also in contrast to Tarso, Pellicer had a tragically abbreviated career. Struggling with depression, she committed suicide in 1964. Her performances in One Eyed Jacks and Macario are a testament to what possibilities were lost.

Pina Pellicer

Another of the great talents connected with the film was the revered cinematographer Gabriel Figueroa who shot over 200 films in a fifty year career. The Day of the Dead sequences resembles documentary footage, but the interiors boast magnificent chiaroscuro effects that give this fable more depth, literally and thematically. 

One further thing that struck me watching Macario was the universality of the rituals and tropes utilized. Mexican Catholicism absorbed many pre-Christian traditions. The offerings of food on the Day of the Dead resembles that of the pujas I witnessed in Asia. Likewise, the supernatural figures who tempt Macario are not dissimilar to those in European folk tales; something Traven, who was probably of German origin, was surely familiar with. Macario was the first Mexican film nominated for Best Foreign Language film. It lost the Oscar to Ingmar Bergman's The Virgin Spring which is also a mix of Christian and pagan themes, as is The Seventh Seal.