| "La
revolución no será transmitida"
(The Revolution will not be televised)
Actualizado//Updated:
19 Abril 2007//April 19, 2007
Wolfgang Schalk // Newspaper
// Gusano de la Luz // Others
8 de Octubre del 2003 (October 3, 2003)
Tri-fold
- PDF Document (English). Prepared by Maritza Ramírez
de Agena and Alexandra Beech. Design by María
Gabriela Fabio
Tríptico
- Documento PDF (Español). Preparado por Maritza
Ramírez de Agena and Alexandra Beech. Diagramación:
María Gabriela Fabio. Traducido al Castellano
por Henrique Lander A., hijo
A.-
Análisis del documental por Wolfgang Schalk
(Español - Spanish)
En el mundo se acepta como un hecho indiscutible que
los medios de comunicación, prensa, radio y
televisión constituyen "el Cuarto Poder”.
Poder que deriva directamente del conocimiento y difusión
de la información. En el ejercicio de ese formidable
poder, ocasionalmente, se han presentado casos de
desviación ética en el ejercicio del
periodismo. No obstante, las instituciones, los editores
y las corporaciones de medios de comunicación
procuran contener esas posibles desviaciones en la
búsqueda de la verdad, brindando una correcta,
completa, equilibrada y oportuna información.
Tal vez, el ejemplo más emblemático
del poder de los medios sea el de los periodistas
del Washington Post de Estados Unidos que hicieron
público el Affaire Watergate, cuyo resultado
fue la incapacitación presidencial (impeachment)
y consecuente renuncia en los Estados Unidos de Norteamérica
de Richard Nixon en un evento sin precedentes hasta
ese momento en la historia. Venezuela tendría
su propio episodio en 1992, cuando la difusión
por parte de los medios del manejo de la partida secreta
obligó a la renuncia de Carlos Andrés
Pérez.
Las desviaciones en el ejercicio del Cuarto Poder,
también, han sido ampliamente reseñadas.
Tal es el caso ocurrido recientemente (1º de
mayo de 2003), cuando un conocido periodista, Jayson
Blair, renuncia al New York Times porque se descubrió
que 36 de sus 75 escritos eran fraude, plagio o presentaban
graves inexactitudes. Un mes más tarde, 2 ejecutivos
del diario responsables del contenido editorial renuncian
por no haber detectado a tiempo el fraude.
Lo anterior viene al caso por lo que reseñaremos
a continuación:
El 13 de abril de 2003, la película "La
Revolución no será transmitida"
se proyecta en español en Venezolana de Televisión-
la emisora oficial- a las 9 de la noche. Es exhibida
simultáneamente en festivales de cine, en la
BBC, así como en televisoras a nivel mundial.
El 11 de Junio de 2003, la película obtiene
en Canadá el premio "Mejor película
del mundo" en la categoría de documentales
y de historia reciente. Al asumir la revisión
del material transmitido y su análisis encontramos
que el mismo presenta elementos que podrían
insertarse en un caso de desviación periodística.
Del minucioso escrutinio -cuadro por cuadro- se deriva
que el documental presenta comprometedoras fisuras
en aspectos tales como: la imparcialidad, precisión,
equidad, integridad editorial e independencia ideológica
de sus productores en una pieza que se pretende y,
además, se premia por su valor histórico.
A los fines de analizar esta aseveración, se
llevó a cabo, en la Red de Veedores, un foro
con protagonistas de primera línea de los eventos
reseñados en el documental. Participaron un
General del Ejército, pieza clave y testigo
presencial de los acontecimientos en Palacio, el Vicepresidente
de Información de una de las más importantes
emisoras privadas de televisión y el Jefe de
la Policía Metropolitana a su cargo durante
los sucesos del 11 de abril de 2002 y los días
subsiguientes.
Recogemos en el siguiente trabajo los diversos análisis
recabados en el foro sobre el premiado documental,
a los fines de dejar registro de las objeciones, cuestionamientos
y dudas que dicho film ha provocado en un sector de
la población. Asimismo, sirve para estimular
en sus lectores el análisis que, a título
personal, harán en torno a la utilización
de tan formidable medio como vehículo de propaganda
y la responsabilidad social de los medios en la transmisión
de mensajes.
El análisis de los protagonistas omitidos en
el documental:
El foro interactivo, además de arrojar luces
sobre aspectos oscuros de los acontecimientos de esos
días, permitió singularizar y extraer
escenas del documental que evidencian graves violaciones
a la información veraz y objetiva, así
como una manipulada deformación histórica.
Esta afirmación se sostiene en los siguientes
elementos:
a) Ausencia testimonial de los sectores y protagonistas
que adversan al gobierno, como es el caso de los dueños
de los medios de comunicación, cuerpos policiales,
y miembros de la Fuerza Armada
b) Descontextualización de declaraciones de
ciudadanos obtenidas en foros vecinales con objetivos
vecinales.
c) La omisión deliberada de hechos públicos,
notorios, documentados y, además, disponibles,
como el llamado de funcionarios del gobierno, a través
de los medios, a la violencia.
d) Presentación de imágenes de manifestaciones
de calle del sector opositor -fácilmente verificable
en el análisis por cuadros- como manifestaciones
de apoyo al gobierno.
e) El guión que vocea la locutora Kim Bartley
dirige sin ambages la interpretación de la
audiencia a favor del gobierno.
f) La edición no se ajusta al orden cronológico
de los acontecimientos y se presentan imágenes
y situaciones para adaptarlos, con fines cuestionables,
a una versión de los productores que atiende
intereses ajenos a la imparcialidad y objetividad
que debe caracterizar un documental.
g) Se omiten situaciones públicas y notorias
de alcance significativo para la correcta interpretación
y documentación de los hechos narrados:
1. La cadena presidencial que anuncia el corte de
las señales de tres canales privados de televisión
2. El anuncio de la renuncia del Presidente hecha
por Lucas Rincón, Ministro de la Defensa el
día 12 de Abril en la madrugada, factor desencadenante
de los hechos subsiguientes.
i) Investigaciones posteriores informan, que las personas
que aparecen en la película con opiniones contrarias
al gobierno no fueron informadas del uso que se daría
a sus declaraciones. Adicionalmente, los productores
de la película no solicitaron ni cuentan con
el permiso para utilizar la imagen de esas personas
en clara violación al derecho a la privacidad.
ii) El público, a quien se le proyecta el documental,
desconoce la realidad venezolana. Resulta tendencioso
que los hechos se presentan como un problema de orden
racial entre blancos y negros, de espaldas a la realidad
de un mestizaje ancestral del que es prueba cualquier
imagen utilizada en la pieza premiada.
iii) Personajes claves, como es el caso de Carlos
Ortega, Presidente de la CTV (Confederación
de Trabajadores de Venezuela) la organización
gremial de los trabajadores, no están debidamente
identificados, lo cual da pie a confusiones inconvenientes
a la hora de interpretar los roles que desempeñaron
en los acontecimientos.
iv) Para finalizar en esta línea de análisis,
tratándose de un documental premiado por su
valor histórico, falta que se incluya en él
para calificar en tal género, la presentación
de las imágenes correspondientes a las agresiones,
daños y amedrentamiento sufridos por los medios
de comunicación privados, por parte de los
Círculos Bolivarianos dirigidos por un reconocido
funcionario oficialista. Este hecho de violencia constituye
un claro atentado a la libertad de expresión.
A todo lo anterior cabe añadir, como un hecho
cuestionable, el que los productores del documental
eludan en la imagen que re-crean de Venezuela, los
contenidos altamente inflamables de las alocuciones
presidenciales, todas ellas registradas en las transcripciones
disponibles en la página Web del gobierno www.venezuela.gov.ve
Ello contribuiría a mantener el carácter
histórico por el que se premia el documental.
* La sucesión de cadenas oficiales que alcanzaron
el número de 31 precedentes a los hechos del
11 de abril
* La cadena del mismo 11 de abril que impide la libre
transmisión de los canales privados que optan
por partir la pantalla para poder informar la magnitud
de los hechos que se estaban sucediendo.
* La cadena presentada el día 14 de abril a
las 3 de la madrugada, una vez repuesto el presidente
en su cargo solicitando perdón; sólo
explicable ante el reconocimiento de un error.
En días posteriores, otro hecho conmociona
a la opinión pública del que no hay
registro alguno en el documental en cuestión
y tiene que ver con el escándalo de gravísimas
consecuencias, como fue la grabación hecha
por radio aficionados, de la intercepción de
las comunicaciones que demuestran la activación
del Plan Ávila y el consiguiente ataque a la
población civil. En dichas grabaciones, queda
clara evidencia de la intención del gobierno
y sus personeros mas importantes (Vicepresidente y
Ministros) durante los hechos del 11 de abril, intenciones
alejadas de las imágenes contritas en Palacio
que son las únicas presentadas en la película.
Las interpelaciones llevadas a cabo en la Asamblea
Nacional tienen registro de las declaraciones en este
sentido, así como de las grabaciones exhibidas
para sustentarlas.
Este hecho reviste particular importancia, pues la
desobediencia a esta orden es la que determina la
fractura de los militares institucionalistas, el posterior
juicio y final exoneración, por parte del Tribunal
Supremo de Justicia, de los militares acusados.
Asimismo, en el documental, se omiten las declaraciones
y desestimaciones por parte de altos funcionarios
que niegan como falsas evidencias imágenes
tales como la de los pistoleros de Llaguno -entre
los cuales se encuentran funcionarios activos como
es el caso del Concejal por el MVR Richard Peñalver-
que hicieron acreedor al periodista Luis Alfonso Fernández
(Venevisión) al Premio Príncipe Asturias
de Periodismo. A estas tomas profesionales, se suman
los video aficionados desde ángulos diferentes,
demostración incuestionable de la legitimidad
de las imágenes y su significado.
Difusión del documental: La película
ha sido transmitida en televisión en diversos
países europeos incluida la BBC de Londres,
RTE de Irlanda, Holanda, Alemania, Italia, etc.
Ha obtenido galardones como documental en varios festivales
internacionales. Uno de ellos, en Canadá con
la fundación BANFF el 9 de junio de 2003, le
otorgó $ 50.000 de premio como "el mejor
documental del mundo". Algunos venezolanos por
iniciativa personal han enviado misivas, informando
sobre las imprecisiones y omisiones del documental
a los organizadores de varios de los premios. Entre
ellos, Jerry Ezekiel -Senior Vice-President- Banff
Television Foundation y Darryl Macdonald -Director,
SIFF
En cuanto al Festival Internacional de cine latino
en Los Ángeles (LALIFF) que culminó
el 2 de agosto de 2003, "La Revolución
no será transmitida" apareció en
el listado de películas participantes como
representante de Venezuela. La Consultoría
Jurídica del Centro Nacional Autónomo
de Cinematografía en Venezuela envió
un correo-e el 26 de junio, expresando que dicha película
es irlandesa y no cumple con los requisitos de la
institución para representar a Venezuela en
dicho festival. Los organizadores subsanaron el error
oportunamente.
En cuanto a las respuestas recibidas a las misivas
enviadas, estas giran en torno a la interpretación
y definición de "documental" que
no es uniforme ni compartida. Otras comunicaciones
señalan como valor el impacto emocional que
provoca y sustentan en ese sólo valor la validez
de su premiación.
Dejaremos que los especialistas en la materia cinematográfica
decidan sobre ese punto.
Nuestra preocupación y motivación al
escribir el presente informe gira en torno a la cualidad
histórica del film, en su intento de recrear
sobre unos acontecimientos que -en pleno desarrollo-
afectan directamente y en tiempo presente, la interpretación
de un país de 25 millones de habitantes y que
muestra una visión incompleta del mismo. Situación
tan delicada que ha ameritado la creación de
una mesa de Negociación y Acuerdo, así
como la instalación en Venezuela del Secretario
de la ONU Dr. César Gaviria y el llamado Grupo
de Amigos integrado por España, México,
Chile, Brasil, Portugal y Estados Unidos que acordó
la salida electoral como única alternativa
a la profunda crisis que vive el país.
El presente informe se inserta en la labor de Veeduría
de Medios.
Observamos, registramos e informamos.
Nota: Tenemos conocimiento de una iniciativa particular
de dos quejas con documentación probatoria
enviadas a la BBC de Londres y a la Radio Televisión
Irlandesa, que esperan respuesta de los productores
de la película. Se sustenta en los estatutos
de ambos servicios que establecen que quienes reciben
apoyo financiero y de imagen para realizar películas,
deben cumplir con las normas internas para productores
que, a juicio de su remitente, han sido ignoradas.
Para el momento de escribir el presente informe, no
se ha recibido respuesta.
Caracas 15 de agosto de 2003
B.- Las
20 mentiras del "documental" sobre Chávez
(Español-Spanish & Inglés-English)
Las
20 mentiras del "documental" sobre Chávez
(Arquímedes Espinoza y equipo El Gusano de
Luz)
English Version
The 20 lies of the documentary on Chávez
This movie, now being exhibited under different titles
such as “The Revolution Will not be Televised”,
“Chávez Inside the Coup” or “Chávez
The film” is a “propaganda” film
designed to twist the Venezuelan reality. The authors
of this film succeeded playing on the good faith and
the sponsorship of serious and well-known organizations
such as the BBC, RTE, ZDF and Arte to broadcast it
in film festivals and to project it all over the world
like a journalistic documentary.
The 20 lies of this movie are as follows:
1) The images where people appear singing, musical
groups and children supposedly in front of the Presidential
Palace of Miraflores on the morning of April 11, 2002,
correspond to another city in Venezuela. That day,
there was not such a spectacle; people were only called
aggressively to “defend the Revolution”.
2) The concentration of the opposition in Chuao, in
the eastern part of the city, was formed by people
of all city areas, including women, elder people,
children and even handicapped people. In no case were
there armed or aggressive people like the movie pretends
to show.
3) The filmmakers ignored the radio and television
“cadena” of President Chávez on
April 11, between 3:45 and 5:27 pm, during which 21
Venezuelans were killed and more than 150 were wounded
in the surroundings of the Presidential Palace. These
“cadenas”, that are very rare in other
countries (Chávez used them 31 times between
April 8 and 11, 2002), consist in forcing all the
open signal TV channels and all radio stations, FM
as well as AM, to join the state channel and broadcast
the same content. However, in the film, it is said
that President Chávez only has the chance of
speaking through the state owned channel.
4) In the middle of the “cadena”, all
private channels, protected by article 58 of the Venezuelan
Constitution, which grants the right of “timely
and truthful information”, decided to split
the screen in two parts in order to be able to show
the tragic events that were happening. Immediately
thereafter, the government jammed he signals of the
private channels in an action that requires a series
of legal actions and technical arrangements to be
executed, which were never observed.
5) During the “cadena” that is not mentioned,
the victims generated by the government supporting
groups and by members of military forces that were
not shown shooting and there is little reference to
the snipers posted on Miraflores bordering buildings,
the access to which is restricted to the presidential
guardianship in emergency situations like those occurring
on April 11.
6) In the film, the producers insist on the thesis
that the President never resigned office. However,
the military high command, lead by the then main military
officer, Lucas Rincón, and current Secretary
for Domestic Affairs of Chávez, stated on a
radio and TV broadcast a little after midnight on
April 12, that “... (the) President was requested
to resign office, which he agreed to”. This
singular event, known by all Venezuelans and of undeniable
importance in the reconstruction of the events of
that day, was simply ignored by the filmmakers in
order induce the idea of a classical “coup d’état”.
7) Regarding the case of the Llaguno Bridge, where
the famous images of a group of Chávez supporters
shooting to the place where the opposition rally was
passing by were taken (the journalistic team that
took the images was awarded the King of Spain’s
Journalism Prize for this report), the film backed
up the government version that these people were not
shooting at any rally and for this, film makers used
images from an amateur video different from those
used by the journalistic team that won the prize in
Spain. In this second video, the avenue underneath
the bridge is completely empty, without persons or
rally walking and no person shooting from the bridge.
Using a procedure similar to the ancient sun dials,
it can be shown by the shadows of the buildings that
the images were taken from about 1:00 to 1:30 in the
afternoon, when the opposition rally was not even
near that location, while the images taken by the
prize-winning journalists were taken between 4:30
and 5:00 in the afternoon, when the tragic events
were indeed happening.
8) The film says that the signal of the state owned
TV station was cut on April 11 by the “coup
mongers” and even showed the effect of a noise
interrupted TV image. All Venezuelans know that on
the night of April 11, 2002, the managers of the state
owned station Venezolana de Televisión Channel
8 themselves, ended the broadcast and peacefully left
the facilities. The doors of Channel 8 remained open
and its facilities empty for almost an hour, until
a group of reporters of the Globovision news station
entered the place and showed us all the studios, offices
and technical centers totally deserted. Later, a group
of officers of the Miranda State Police (the Venezuelan
state where Channel 8 is situated) arrived in order
to protect the facilities and equipment.
9) In the aforementioned images, scenes are reconstructed
with the participation of high officers of the Chávez’
government “acting” what was actually
happening in Channel 8. This resource, which can be
considered to be adequate under certain rules and
circumstances in certain ethnographic and educational
documentaries, is completely anti-ethical in a documentary
that is presented as a truthful version of historical
events; because the filmmakers never forewarned that
they are creating a “staging”.
10) Certain images were presented as if they occurred
before April 11, 2002, while they were made 3 months
later. This is the case of a neighbors meeting held
in June 2002, with the aim of preparing defensive
actions in view of the threats made by the government
through its “Bolivarian Circles” (groups
of aggressive militants of the government’s
party who frequently attack the public opposition
demonstrations with stones, sticks and even gunshots)
of attacking the housing estates of Caracas where
the opposition predominates. This meeting, recorded
without any written consent, portrays a group of mostly
women, receiving self-defense training from a voluntary
instructor in order to learn to defend themselves
– in June 2002- from a presumed attack by the
government supporting groups. However, the scene was
edited and presented as if happening in February 2002
as a part of the opposition arrangements to march
and attack Miraflores on April 11, 2002.
11) The film shows the Venezuelan crisis as a as a
confrontation between a white and corrupt privileged
minority, and a black or mixed-blood, poor, healthy
and happy majority, defended by President Chávez.
This simplified scheme, which otherwise corresponds
to the political and diplomatic speech of the government
in all international forums, constitutes a shameful
misrepresentation of the history, the sociology and
the political present condition of Venezuela. The
filmmakers barely investigated on this reality, without
deepening in it, thereby producing a rather biased,
superficial, and to a great extent, untruthful document,
wherein no European (Spaniard, Italian, Portuguese),
Arab, Asian and Latin American immigrants, who came
to Venezuela and were integrated therein, in the most
diverse productive sectors: industry, commerce, arts,
etc. appeared.
12) This diverse, plural and multitudinous condition
of those who in Venezuela democratically oppose President
Chávez, was completely ignored by the filmmakers.
If this were a question of a real research documentary
– as prestigious TV chains like BBC, ZDF, RTE,
Arte y NPS should demand – the film should have
shown the amplitude and variety of this opposing sector,
constituted, among others, by the most important writers,
artists, scientists, thinkers, jurists and professionals
of the country, as well as millions of men and women
of the working class, poor people who believed in
Chávez and have been disappointed by his appalling
government.
13) Filmmakers Kim Bartley and Donnacha O’Briain
preferred to reduce the Venezuelan opposition to the
false image of a group of rich women, worried about
their privileges. They omitted the gigantic opposition
rallies, the magnitude of which has astonished the
whole world since last year. If they had included
them, they would have shown the ethnic and social
diversity present during these demonstrations, with
a predominance of mixed-blood people and poor people.
Those presumed “rich ladies” are Venezuelan
women who have fought for three years a beautiful
and brave democratic battle in the streets of Venezuela,
even though they have been several times attacked
and humiliated by the mercenary bands of the government
and the very armed forces. In this battle, they have
been accompanied by people of all socioeconomic strata,
because the political problem in Venezuela is not
the consequence of a class confrontation, as the government
spreads, and this documentary shows, but a struggle
between democracy and a blossoming dictatorship.
14) The filmmakers were very careful when selecting
the images of popular support to Chávez in
Caracas (at the beginning of the documentary); they
used takes from February 2000, when the support was
undeniable, enthusiastic and massive; and to show
the opposition rallies, the filmmakers used only closed
takes of few white skinned people and wealthy appearance,
avoiding open frames. However, these images of government
supporting rallies are no longer easy to obtain, because
these rallies are currently reduced and unenthusiastic,
attended for the most part by only a few spontaneous
assistants and government workers who are forced to
attend. The filmmakers tell the viewers: “this
is an accurate narration, with its clearly indicated
days and hours.”
15) The armored cars (tanks) shown at the beginning
of the film suggesting that they were a part of the
military component that participated in the “oligarch
coup d’état supported by the USA”,
were never used against the President and his government.
Their presence was the result of a plan, called Plan
Ávila, ordered by Chávez himself, which
was partially obeyed and amply repudiated by the high
military command, because it was about a display of
war weapons intended to be used against civilian demonstrators
that were marching on April 11 to the Palace of Miraflores.
16) The film tells us unequivocally: “while
Carmona pronounced his inauguration speech, two blocks
away the police was hitting and shooting against the
people...” (there is even “voice over”
of Carmona on the images of repression). This is false.
On April 12, Caracas was normal; the only street demonstrations
were made by some exalted opposition members in front
of the Embassy of Cuba and in front of the houses
of two or three leaders of Chávez government.
It is truth that small government supporting groups
posted themselves in the vicinity of the presidential
palace on the afternoon of April 12, without disturbing
the peace. The scenes shown by the film of policemen
dispersing demonstrators certainly happened on the
morning of April 13. This disarrangement of times
can not be considered to be an innocent film mistake,
as it leads to totally erroneous conclusions regarding
what happened in Venezuela those days.
17) When mentioning the workers and business organizations
opposing the government, the film only mentions initials
that have no meaning abroad; it never talks about
the main national labor union or the largest business
association grouping all the business chambers of
the country.
18) During the events after April 11, the film mentions
a deliberate absence of news, but it does not talk
about the news of events broadcasted by TV stations,
as well as the threats and attacks suffered by media
during those days.
19) In the film it is falsely stated that the soldiers
rebelling against the events of April 11, traveled
abroad once the President was brought back to office,
but the film does not mention the long trials these
military officers were submitted to and that they
were later absolved by the Supreme Court from the
charges of coup d’état that were pressed
by the government.
20) Mister Andrés Izarra, the main witness
of the film against the private TV media, is now a
high ranked officer in the Embassy of Venezuela in
the USA. Izarra is the son of Commander William Izarra,
a conspirator mate of Hugo Chávez during more
than 10 years in the heart of the Venezuelan Armed
Forces and current Ideology Director of the government
party.
C.-
Urgent Investigation about "Chavez-the coup"
by the 5 European TV Corporations who financed the
film which presents blatant falsehoods about Venezuela
(Inglés - English)
Apoye la campaña para denunciar las falsedades
de “ La revolución no será transmitida”
Sign the petition:
Firma
la petición que El Gusano de Luz hace a las
5 Corporaciones de TV, que financiaron la película
"The Revolution Will Not Be Televised"
D.-
CINE - FORO - 21 de Octubre del 2003: ¡La patraña
fue desmontada! por El Gusano de Luz (Español
- Spanish)
El Cine Foro demostró que:
Se manipuló la realidad de los sucesos
de Abril 2002.
Que importantes medios de comunicación internacionales
se prestaron para la realización de este material.
La dignidad de Venezuela requiere de las excusas y
rectificaciones públicas de esos medios.
Para leer la reseña, hacer click aquí
E.- The Revolution
Will Not Be Televised - Why is Amnesty Not Screening
a New Documentary About the Failed 2002 Coup in Venezuela?
(Inglés - English)
Click here
to read the debate on why a planned screening of the
film was canceled by the organizers of the Amnesty
International Film Festival in Vancouver. Also you
can listen to or watch the interview
F.- Videos
(Español-Spanish)
| VIDEOS |
Tipo
de Conexión |
Tipo
de Conexión |
Duración
aproximada |
Idioma |
Programa
Especial de Napoleón Bravo sobre "The
Revolution Will Not be Televised - Parte
I |
|
-- |
44'
44'' |
Español |
Programa
Especial de Napoleón Bravo sobre "The
Revolution Will Not be Televised - Parte
II |
|
-- |
51'
53'' |
Español |
|
-- |
-- |
1h 21' 11" |
Español
(subtitles in English) |
G.- Artículos - Articles (Español-Spanish
& Inglés-English)
Artículos
- Articles |
Autor
- Author |
| |
Phil
Gunson |
| |
tvtoday.com |
|
Petroleumworld.com |
|
El Universal |
|
El Universal |
|
Rosa
Haydée Sanchez |
|
Alexandra
Beech |
|
El Nacional |
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El Universal |
*
Columbia Journalism Review by Phil Gunson
(March 2004)
Did an acclaimed documentary about the 2002 coup
in Venezuela tell the whole story?
In September 2001, two young Irish filmmakers,
Kim Bartley and Donnacha O’Briain, arrived
in Venezuela with plans to make a low-budget, fly-on-the-wall
documentary about the country’s flamboyant
president, Hugo Chávez. A former army officer,
Chávez had attempted a coup d’état
in 1992, spent a couple of years in jail, and was
elected to the presidency in 1998. His followers
revere him as a revolutionary, struggling to bring
justice to the poor in the face of savage attacks
from a local oligarchy backed by Washington. His
adversaries call him a dangerous demagogue who has
ruined the economy, polarized the nation, and is
steadily dismantling a forty-five-year-old democracy.
Bartley and O’Briain belong unabashedly in
the former camp.
In today’s Venezuela, it is hard, if not impossible,
to find an impartial observer. Most of the country’s
private news media have openly joined the opposition.
State radio and TV are crude cheerleaders for the
government. Bartley and O’Briain, however,
while rightly criticizing the former, ignore the
sins of the latter.
Seven months into their project, persistence and
good fortune brought a scoop: they were inside the
presidential palace when Chávez was ousted
by a military-civilian uprising. The resulting documentary
— underwritten by the BBC, Ireland’s
RTE, and other European broadcasters — is
as thrilling a piece of political drama as you’re
likely to see and has won armfuls of prizes, including
Britain’s top documentary award, the Grierson.
It has aired repeatedly all around the world, has
been shown in movie theaters and at film festivals,
arguably becoming the prevailing interpretation
of the continuing Venezuelan political crisis. The
Chávez government, which had 20,000 copies
made in Cuba, has been a tireless promoter and distributor
of the film.
“It is probably one of the best documentaries
I have ever seen on television, and undoubtedly
one of the finest pieces of journalism within living
memory,” gushed Declan Lynch, a television
critic for Ireland’s Sunday Independent, in
a fairly typical review of Chávez: Inside
the Coup. “The plot was classically simple:
Chávez gets democratically elected, to the
chagrin of the evil oil-barons and their good buddies
in the Bush administration, who express ‘extreme
concern’ that Chávez ‘doesn’t
have America’s interest at heart.’ Chávez
gets ousted by these malign forces, spirited away
amid scenes of chaos orchestrated by them. But Santa
María! his palace guards remain loyal, and
amid scenes of total consternation, Chávez
is brought back, the coup is declared null and void
by the good guys on state television, and the evil
oil-barons flee to Miami, having duly emptied the
safe in the palace.”
That engaging narrative is, unfortunately, somewhat
at odds with the complex, messy reality of April
2002, when a mass march on the presidential palace
in Caracas ended in a massacre and a short-lived
change of government. Bartley and O’Briain
are entitled to their views, but a close analysis
of the film reveals something worse than political
naiveté. Constructing a false picture of
a classic military coup devised by an allegedly
corrupt and racist oligarchy, they omit key facts,
invent others, twist the sequence of events to support
their case, and replace inconvenient images with
others dredged from archives. (A version of the
film in Spanish is called La Revolucion No Sera
Transmitida: The Revolution Will Not Be Televised.)
By the time of the coup, Venezuela had been embroiled
for almost six months in a severe political crisis.
The lid blew off when Chávez moved to rid
the state oil corporation, Petróleos de Venezuela,
of its top managers and directors, whom he perceived
as inimical to his self-styled “revolution.”
Chávez recently admitted that he deliberately
provoked the showdown: the result was that oil managers,
business leaders, and large segments of organized
labor called a work stoppage, backed by millions
of Venezuelans, particularly the country’s
increasingly impoverished middle class. Disaffected
military officers, angry at Chávez’s
drive to place the armed forces at the service of
his political project, were also involved.
On the morning of April 11, an estimated 500,000
people conducted an opposition march. The government
called on its supporters to form a human shield
around the presidential palace and attempted to
activate a military defense plan. When the marchers,
who had deviated from their original route, approached
the palace, shooting broke out on all sides. A score
of civilians died and more than 150 suffered gunshot
wounds. The military high command called for Chávez
to resign, and at 3:20 the next morning they announced
he had agreed to do so. The presidency was assumed
by a business leader, Pedro Carmona, but his government
collapsed in less than forty-eight hours and Chávez
returned to power.
In Bartley and O’Briain’s film, the
chavistas (as the president’s supporters are
known) are invariably poor, brown-skinned, and cheerful.
The opposition, on the other hand, is rich, white,
racist, and violent. Unseen are the armed bands
of chavista thugs who for years have made the center
of Caracas a no-go area, beating up or shooting
opposition marchers or TV crews who dare to approach.
Invisible, too, are the massive — and multiracial
— peaceful opposition rallies, whose huge
numbers belie the government’s claim to represent
the masses.
In June, two months after the violence, Bartley
and O’Briain filmed a group of condominium
residents discussing how to defend themselves against
possible chavista attacks. But the film —
whose narrative purports to follow a strict chronology
— inserted the interviews before the march.
When I challenged Bartley on that in an exchange
of e-mails, she dismissed the criticism, saying
the producers felt that “the views expressed
at this meeting illustrated the collective mind
of the opposition long before the coup ever took
place.”
Important to her argument are images of peaceful
chavistas facing a violent opposition march. She
inserts a sequence ostensibly filmed outside the
presidential palace on the morning of April 11 in
which Caracas’s mayor, Freddy Bernal —
a leading chavista radical — sings and plays
the maracas for a crowd of smiling government supporters.
The backdrop to the platform, however, reveals that
the sequence does not belong to that day, when a
differently dressed Bernal was organizing an armed
defense of the palace.
Until coming under fire, the opposition march was
entirely peaceful. But in the documentary, images
of the march’s violent finale, along with
one shot taken two days earlier, are inserted near
the start of the demonstration. “The opposition
march was fast approaching,” the commentary
declares, “and some in the vanguard looked
ready for a fight.”
Before the march neared the palace, a number of
people were shot, and several killed there. The
film suggests that they were shot by “the
coup plotters.” The fact is — as Bartley
and O’Briain later admitted — we don’t
know who was shooting. Nevertheless, a Venevisión
reporter named Luis Alfonso Fernández was
hustled off a rooftop for filming chavista gunmen
apparently firing at the opposition march.
That film, repeated incessantly on the opposition
TV channels, became the most contentious image of
the entire day. Bartley accepts a government argument
that “the opposition march had never taken
that route” and that the gunmen were merely
returning fire from snipers and the opposition-controlled
police. She fails to mention that several people
on the opposition march were shot dead, and many
more wounded, less than two blocks from the gunmen.
An image she uses showing an empty street below
the Llaguno Bridge on which the gunmen were standing
was filmed much earlier than the Fernández
sequence, according to an analysis of the shadows
by Wolfgang Schalk, a Venezuelan TV producer.
While the shooting was going on, Chávez commandeered
all radio and TV frequencies for a speech that lasted
almost two hours. He had used this prerogative up
to seventeen times during the previous day. When
private TV channels split the screen during his
speeches to show the accompanying violence, the
president ordered the National Guard to shut them
down. None of this is featured in the film, which
wrongly claims that state TV (VTV) was “the
only channel to which he had access.” Later
that evening, VTV went off the air after its staff
deserted. The film implies that it was taken over
by coup-plotters, and even fabricates a sequence
in which the TV screen goes blank during a government
legislator’s interview.
As the documentary proceeds, the atmosphere inside
the palace is — not unnaturally — becoming
pretty tense. “We could see on TV that the
palace had been surrounded by tanks,” says
the film’s narrator. The “tanks”
(actually armored cars) had been ordered there by
the president, not the opposition.
More serious is the deliberate blurring of responsibility
for the coup. The high command that announced Chávez’s
resignation — then quickly dissolved, leaving
a total power vacuum — never in reality abandoned
the president’s cause. Its senior figure,
General-in-chief Lucas Rincón, is currently
the interior minister. With one exception —
the army commander, General Efraín Vásquez
— they took no part in the Carmona government.
Vásquez himself withdrew support from Carmona
in less than two days, bringing down his short-lived
regime. A group of senior officers, who released
a videotaped statement withdrawing their support
from Chávez, is presented in the film as
if they were the high command. Their leader, Vice-Admiral
Héctor Ramírez Pérez, is identified
as the head of the navy. He was not. With one solitary
exception, these generals and admirals had not “fled
abroad” after the Carmona government collapsed,
as the film claims.
In constructing their alternative reality, the directors
omit all mention of an announcement by General Rincón
that Chávez had resigned, later calling it
“supplementary to the main, key fact of the
story” (i.e., their contention that he did
not). They declined to respond to my argument that
scenes in the documentary were fabricated, or placed
out of sequence to alter the chain of cause-and-effect,
saying they were “tired of having our film
subjected to frame-by-frame analysis in an attempt
to discredit it for political reasons.”
The opposition media, as the film rightly points
out, behaved disgracefully during the April events.
They systematically excluded the chavista viewpoint
from print, radio, and TV in the period April 11-13.
But how ironic that a film purporting to set the
record straight should itself turn out to be an
exercise in propaganda.
Source: http://www.cjr.org/issues/2004/3/gunson-docu.asp
*
tvtoday.com (5 de Febrero del 2004)
BBC investigating complaints about Venezuela documentary
Letter: Surprised about the results of the Lord
Hutton inquiry? Maybe disappointed because not all
the the questions were answered, but for a vast
majority of Venezuelan people, an unethical behavior
from a BBC journalist is not a surprise at all.
Since 2003 various complaints were submitted at
different levels of the BBC because of a co-produced
video on the tragic events of April 2002 in Venezuela
when the president was overthrown and put back in
power by the army in a period of 72 hours. The complaints
did not get any further. Of course, those who complained
are not Number 10 nor the UK Prime Minister.
Sadly, we do have many suicides committed by people
of the opposition who could not cope with the tragedy
of having all their rights, their jobs, their entire
existence taken away with violence and total disrispect
for human conditions. One was a teenager who killed
himself in the precint of the university. We also
have many people being killed, abused, tortured,
including children, by the regime. Nothing of that
is mentioned in the video.
It would be too long to explain the colossal ethical
violations committed by the producers of the video
which is being intensively broadcasted around the
world like a well orchestrated marketing campaign.
Just a few examples. They omitted the massacre committed
by regime supporters at the exact time the president
was intervining all the radio and TV networks to
“make an announcement”. They never mentioned
either all the other massacres commited by Chavez
regime supporter in public squares or pacific marches.
They also never mentioned that the Chief of the
Army announced on the 12th of April that Chavez
had resigned. The few thousands of supporters Chavez
had, did not put him pback on power, it was again,
the Army as in all historical dictatorships.
The producers lied to people of the opposition about
the real subject of the video to be able to shot
some images which are insulting and totally out
of context (actually they lied in the video about
the date these images were shot). Some people´s
images appear without their authorization posing
them at risk of being victims of the violence of
the regime supporters.
A series of complaint have now been introduced to
the Broadcasting Commission. We hope that “fairness
and accuracy” are valued equally in the case
of a first world Government than for a bunch of
illiterates, as BBC called us in a previous documentary
again pro-Chavez.
We also expect that the massive violations of Human
Rights in Venezuela will finally be unvelied by
BBC and other braodcasting networks around the world.
Or should we, the Venezuelans, start to believe
that some Human Rights are more valuable than others
depending on who is behind the camera?
Cinzia De Santis Melchor.
This letter refers to a documentary about April
2002 coup in Venezuela, which for a short time toppled
the leader Hugo Chavez. Broadcast in the UK as Chavez
- Inside The Coup and across the world as The Revolution
Will Not Be Televised , the documentary was a co-production
of the BBC, RTE, ZDF, NPS, YLE and ARTE.
The author is a scientist who lived in Venezuela
until August 2003.
We invited the BBC to comment on this letter. A
spokewoman said: “We have received complaints
concerning this programme and are currently looking
into them. We feel it is inappropriate to comment
further at this stage.”
Fuente: http://www.tvtoday.co.uk/article.php?p=128&more=1
*
Petroleumworld.com (19 de Noviembre)
“The Revolution will not be televised”:
truth or fraud? by Gustavo Coronel
I say fraud and here are the reasons: A film on
the Venezuelan events of April 2002, called “The
Revolution will not be televised”, has been
showing all over the world with some success. Impartial
observers of the Venezuelan situation, after seeing
the film, have been led to think of Chavez as the
hero and the Venezuelan opposition as the villains
of the story.
The Chavez government certainly shows this film
as a testimony of how the brave people of Venezuela
defended their legitimate President from the coupsters.
10,000 VHS copies of this film have been made in
Cuba (paid for by Chavez) to give away to anyone
who might be interested to see it.
The main witness in the film against the private
TV stations, Mr. Andres Izarra, is a paid employee
of the Venezuelan Embassy in Washington D.C. and
a son of Commander William Izarra ... one of the
leaders of the failed February 1992 coup, together
with Chavez.
When the Chavez TV station “Venezolana de
Television” aired this film on April 13, 2003,
thousands of viewers who had played a direct role
in the events depicted, felt that the film did not
reflect accurately the events that had taken place.
Since that was a one-time shot, viewers did not
have a real chance to comment on the contents of
the film.
It is now, after more than one year that an expert,
independent analysis of this film has been made.
Former BBC employee, engineer Wolfgang Schalk, and
Venezuelan film producer Thaelman Urgelles came
together and presented the film on October 3 and
October 10 on local television and ... once more
... on October 21 at an open forum held in Caracas,
in what they called “A rendezvous with the
Truth.”
The hundreds of Venezuelans who attended this forum
included audiovisual specialists, sociologists,
direct witnesses of the events contained in the
film and general public, both in favor and against
the government of Chavez.
As a result, those who were there could appreciate,
in full, the numerous distortions of the truth,
the biased interpretations of the events, the lack
of ethics of the producers of the film and the faulty
research made by those producers, leading to totally
dishonest conclusions.
The analysts mention the following examples of such
distortion and dishonesty:
1. Showing a pretended popular concentration in
front of the Presidential Palace on the morning
of April 11, 2002, the film utilizes material from
another concentration held, not only at a different
date but in another city of Venezuela, with children
singing and everyone in a festive mood.
2. The film producers did not mention the TV and
Radio Hookups imposed by Chavez on April 11, between
3:45 p.m. and 5:27 p.m., speaking for nearly 2 hours
while no less than 21 Venezuelans died and more
than 120 were wounded in the vicinity of his headquarters.
Readers from northern countries do not know about
compulsory hookups ... they have never been subjected
to them in their democratic countries. They force
private media to show only what the government is
saying. When people started dying, the private TV
stations started to show the events in a one-split
screen. Immediately the government took them off
the air, something that cannot be done unless you
make preparations in advance.
3. The film insists that President Chavez never
resigned from his post. But we all saw the current
Minister of the Interior, General Lucas Rincon,
say on national TV, at 3.20 a.m. on April 12: “We
asked the President for his resignation and he accepted
it…”
Was he telling the truth? Apparently so, because
at that moment a tearful President Chavez was in
custody in Caracas, asking to be put in a plane
to Cuba.
Was he lying? If so, he was part of the “coup”
and, as such, could not be today the Minister of
the Interior in Chavez’ cabinet. This remarkable
event was totally ignored by the producers of the
film ... the film did not show the arrival of the
fallen President to Fuerte Tiuna, the military fort
in Caracas, where he was received by two bishops
who tried to put him at ease.
4. The case of the Puente Llaguno Killers is quite
complex. For those who are not audiovisual experts
it would be difficult to see that these killers
were shooting at a real target. According to the
film they were shooting at no one. The analyst,
Mr. Schalk, proved that the events depicted in the
film had been taken at 1:00-1:30 p.m., when the
opposition march was nowhere in sight. The real
images of the killers shooting innocent people were
taken between 4:30 and 5:00 p.m. when, in fact,
the tragic events were taking place. The producers
of the film did not have access to, or did not use
these takes from the journalists who have been given
the Spanish prize.
5. Another lie had to do with the claim by the film
that the government TV channel was taken off the
air on April 11. We all saw this TV station on air
during the evening of the 11, a military officer
acting as an announcer, claiming that the station
was surrounded by hostile persons and under threat
from hostile “military forces.” The
truth is that no military forces were in the streets
of Caracas at that time ... the government channel
was left abandoned, but unmolested, for the rest
of the evening.
6. Some images shown in the film appear as having
been taken before April 11 when, in fact, they were
taken 3 months later. I refer to a meeting of citizens
getting ready to protect themselves from a possible
attack by Chavistas. The persons, almost all women,
were receiving instructions on how to defend themselves
(in June 2002) from a possible Chavista attack.
The film shows this take as having occurred in January
2002, to illustrate the preparations of the “rich”
people against the poor. The editing is particularly
dishonest, as it shows elegant surroundings, suggesting
the war of the rich against the poor.
7. The version aired by BBC in October 2003 already
shows this correction, the result of a letter by
Mr. Schalk to the BBC in July 2003. This means that
BBC is already rectifying some of the errors of
the original film but this, in no way, eliminates
the responsibility and lack of ethics of the producers.
8. Images, dates and times have been grossly manipulated.
The takes on Chavez’ support audiences date
back to 2000, when this support was real. This fraud
is greater since the film makers have stressed the
fact that their “narration is exact in time.”
This time distortion is especially evident in the
sequences of April 11, 12 and 13. In those sequences,
the film changes times with total irresponsibility
in order to build a story that suits their interests.
For example the film shows the group of Generals
and Admirals giving their joint declaration at 3:00
p.m. when, in fact, this took place at 6:21 p.m.
via CNN.
9. The film depicts the crisis as a clash between
the white and the colored, the rich and the poor,
the corrupt and the honest. This is the greatest
fraud of all. Venezuela is a mestizo country where
racial hatred and class warfare had been non-existent
until Chavez came into power. His complex of inferiority,
his lack of ability to inspire our society to build
a better country has led the country into turmoil.
Kim Bartley and Donnacha O’Brien have constructed
a film, which presents a false image of our society.
10. The tanks shown in the film as belonging to
the opposition on April 11 do, in fact, belong to
Mr. Chavez ... Chavez' order of to repress the April
11 march was disobeyed by his Generals ... this
was the starting point of the so-called “coup.”
These Generals are still in the country ... they
did not flee as the film suggests ... they are the
real heroes of these events, as they refused to
shoot on unarmed Venezuelan citizens.
We have not yet seen the end of this so-called documentary
film.
Somebody is being dishonest, somebody has committed
fraud, and somebody got paid for this.
The moment of truth is getting nearer.
*
El Universal (16 de Noviembre)
Cineastas venezolanos objetan video "La Revolución
no será transmitida"
Desarman una farsa mediática
Para Wolfgang Schalk y Thaelman Urgelles es un video
que manipula la información.
"El documental irlandés construye una
historia según la que el presidente, por
favorecer a los sectores pobres, se ha echado encima
a la oligarquía" _THAELMAN URGELLES
MANUEL LEBON
EL UNIVERSAL
El 11 de abril del 2002, la cineasta irlandesa Kim
Bartley se encontraba documentando la llamada revolución
bolivariana cuando se le presentó la oportunidad
de su vida al registrarse la masacre de la marcha
opositora y la salida temporaria del primer mandatario
nacional. A partir de esos terribles sucesos, Bartley
creó a dos manos con su compatriota Donnacha
O'Brien el documental, La Revolución no será
transmitida, segmento que contó con el soporte
de las poderosas cadenas europeas BBC, ZDF, RTE,
Arte y NPS y que fue mostrado por primera vez por
VTV el 13 de abril de 2003. Posteriormente, el Gobierno
hizo 10 mil copias en Cuba de esta producción
para mostrarla en diversas partes del mundo.
Esta producción claramente sesgada hacia
el proyecto revolucionario del gobierno actual ha
sido objeto de un cuidadoso análisis por
parte del ingeniero y productor cinematográfico
Wolfgang Schalk, quien pasó cuatro meses
analizando la cinta toma por toma para descubrir
gran cantidad de inconsistencias, omisiones y manipulaciones
en la edición. Apoyado por el conocido cineasta
Thaelman Urgelles, Schalk ha desmontado publicamente
la inmensa patraña mediática que representa
este documental y se han movilizado con detalladas
cartas y peticiones en línea para frenar
el avance de un trabajo de propaganda política
disfrazado de producción objetiva.
Ambos cineastas se hallan finiquitando un documental
de dos horas de duración. "El video
ya estará listo la semana entrante y desmonta
toda la película y se pasan imágenes
alternativas que son interpretadas por Thaelman
y por mí", explicó Wolfgang Schalk.
Este documental de la dupla irlandesa "construye
una historia que parece un discurso de Chávez
en la ONU", en palabras de Thaelman Urgelles,
ya "que vende esta idea: como que tenemos un
presidente, que por favorecer a los sectores mestizos
y pobres se ha echado encima a una oligarquía
blanca que está perdiendo sus privilegios.
Esa oligarquía blanca le dio un golpe de
estado el 11 de abril con apoyo de los EEUU. La
cinta no tiene desperdicio: negros contra blancos,
pobres contra ricos y un final emblemático
en que el gobernante es rescatado por el pueblo".
La pieza audovisual "tiene un lobby millonario
que cuenta con apoyo de las embajadas venezolanas
y hasta agencias de relaciones públicas que
manejan presupuestos enormes para exhibir la cinta
gratuitamente en las universidades o en cines comerciales
de urbes como San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago
o Nueva York. El Gobierno está logrando crear
un fenómeno comunicacional con esa película
así como lo fue El Mariachi: una película
muy chiquita a la que le meten un dineral en promoción
para llevarla al mundo".
La movilización de la oposición se
anotó una victoria al evitar que el documental
se exhibiera el mes pasado en un festival de cine
de Vancouver (Canadá), gracias a la intervención
del capítulo Pacífico de Amnistía
Internacional de Canadá. Posteriormente,
el viernes 7 de noviembre, el periodista Clodovaldo
Hernández (El Universal) escribió
un artículo titulado La "mordaza del
gusano", donde afirmaba que esta acción
era la primera aplicación de la tan mentada
Ley Mordaza pero por parte de "la sección
cultural de la Coordinadora Democrática,
llamada El gusano de luz". Ante esta crítica
Thaelman Urguelles considera que "El Gusano
de luz no fue el que solicitó a Anmistía
que la película no se exhibiese en Canadá
sino que fue una petición en línea
que reunió como 8 mil firmas y que fue iniciativa
de la organización Resistencia Civil de Venezolanos
en el Exterior. La justificación que dio
Anmistía, organización que suele mantener
una posición neutral, fue que la cinta estaba
demasiado parcializada hacia un sector político.
A esta organización le estaban metiendo gato
por liebre pero ante la alerta de los venezolanos,
que les previnieron que ese film no encajaba dentro
de lo que ellos apoyan, tomaron acciones".
En este momento hay otra petición similar
ante los cinco canales que patrocinaron la película
y donde se desmontan con gran detalle todas las
irregularidades que los cineastas hallaron en la
cinta y se piden tres pronunciamientos: que se investigue
la película de marras; si la investigación
arroja resultados correctos, ajustados a la realidad,
que pidan excusas; y finalmente que se materialice
un derecho a réplica. La petición,
una de las más visitadas por venezolanos
en el exilio y extranjeros, lleva más de
9 mil solicitudes consignadas en la dirección
www.petitiononline.com/gusano03.
*
El Universal (16 de Noviembre)
Observaciones Específicas
‚ Pueblo revolucionario.
Al mostrar la presencia de un supuesto pueblo frente
al Palacio Presidencial de Miraflores la mañana
del 11 de abril de 2002, la película utiliza
imágenes de una concentración ocurrida
en un día diferente y en otra ciudad de Venezuela
cuando en realidad ese día estaban los partidarios
del Gobierno convocando agresivamente a la gente
a "defender la Revolución". También
se muestra más tarde la tarima colocada el
11 de abril frente a Miraflores, que es otra.
‚ Pantalla partida. Las cineastas responsables
del film ignoraron la cadena de Chávez el
11 de abril, entre las 3:45 y las 5:27 pm, en la
cual el presidente habló por más de
dos horas mientras en los alrededores de su palacio
morían 21 venezolanos y más de 150
quedaban heridos. En la mitad de esta cadena, los
canales privados decidieron dividir la pantalla
en dos para poder mostrar los sucesos trágicos
y entonces el Gobierno tumbó la señal
de los canales.
‚ La renuncia. En la película se insiste
en la tesis de que el presidente nunca renunció
al cargo. Sin embargo, el alto mando militar, encabezado
por el General en Jefe Lucas Rincón, emitió
una declaración por radio y TV a las 3:20
de la madrugada del 12 de Abril, donde anunció
a viva voz que "... se le pidió al Señor
Presidente la renuncia a su cargo, la cual aceptó".
Esta declaración no aparece en la película.
‚ Tanques de guerra. Los tanques que desplazaron
el 12 de Abril hacia Miraflores no eran para atacar
a Chávez, sino que él mismo les movilizó
para atacar la marcha. El film hace presumir que
con esos vehículos se consumó un golpe
de estado tradicional.
‚ Guerra racial. La composición racial
en Venezuela es multiétnica pero el film
deja el sabor que el chavismo es oscuro de piel
y la oposición blanca y acomodada.
‚ Tiempo alterado. La manipulación
de imágenes, fechas y horas erradas está
presente a lo largo de toda la película.
Por ejemplo, las cineastas tuvieron muy buen cuidado
al escoger las imágenes de apoyo popular
a Chávez, para lo cual utilizaron tomas de
febrero de 2000, cuando el apoyo era innegable.
‚ Proyecto comunicacional. La distorsión
de los tiempos es particularmente atroz en las secuencias
correspondientes al 11, 12 y 13 de abril. Allí,
la película cambia con total irresponsabilidad
las horas de los sucesos, con el objeto de construir
un relato subordinado a su proyecto comunicacional,
cual no es otro que vender la tesis del "golpe
de estado oligarca, apoyado por los Estados Unidos".
*
El efecto BOLA DE NIEVE Amenaza a la Revolución
La única manera de evitar que la película
denominada La Revolución no será televisada,
sea arrasada por el efecto bola de nieve, es que
el gobierno de Hugo Chávez, recoja todos
los videos que andan circulando por el mundo; pague
para que la misma no se exhiba en ninguna sala de
cine y demande por estafa a sus productoras Kim
Bartley ,Donnacha O´Briain y en consecuencia
a sus patrocinadores.
Esta acción es lo único que podría
reivindicar a este gobierno que a escala mundial,
ha sometido a la burla y descalificación
al pueblo venezolano, al hacerlo partícipe
de este montaje sesgado sobre los sucesos del 11
de abril de 2002, que dejó 21 muertos y más
de 150 heridos.
Quizás si el trabajo se hubiese hecho con
un mínimo de ética el resultado hubiese
sido un documento histórico de extraordinaria
enseñanza, pero lamentablemente no fue así.
La omisión intencional de acontecimientos
determinantes ocurridos ese 11 de abril, le quita
validez y su carácter de documental para
ubicarlo en la categoría de propaganda política
con un mensaje tan confuso, que en lugar de presentar
a Chávez como un líder acorde con
el Siglo XXI, lo muestra como el típico dictador
de cualquier país bananero.
La revisión en frío de este compendio
de imágenes, revela todas las costuras de
su producción. No explican por ejemplo como
ellas y sus cámaras montadas en trípodes,
pudieron permanecer en el Palacio de Miraflores
entre el 11 y el 13 de abril. Pareciera entonces
que lo ocurrido esos días, fue lo que muchos
calificaron como un “auto golpe”. De
otra manera cuesta entender este desafío
al peligro y conduce a especular que el cacareado
golpe contra Chávez fue de laboratorio.
En el montaje y la edición está el
“éxito” que hasta este momento
ha tenido esta película. Imágenes
avasalladoras de soldados, armas, gente, música,
mucho color rojo y por supuesto Chávez en
papel protagónico dejan ver también
que las escenas fueron escogidas calculadamente
y editadas de tal
manera que provocaran distintas emociones en los
espectadores. Además hay varias versiones
de la misma producción. De allí la
polémica que ha generado su puesta en pantalla
y el análisis que investigadores de la comunicación
y expertos en lenguaje cinematográfico están
haciendo de su contenido.
Aún cuando muchos pretenden ubicar las posiciones
en torno a este montaje, como un ejemplo más
de la polarización política que viven
los venezolanos, es importante destacar que hay
una mano peluda estimulando esta posición
para que no se vea el verdadero contenido de La
Revolución no será televisada, donde
ni siquiera el muchacho de la película queda
bien parado y que decir de los actores de relleno
–el pueblo venezolano- que es ridiculizado
y descalificado en cada una de sus apariciones.
Parte de ese pueblo es presentado como una masa
pobre, analfabeta, desvalida y fácil de manipular
a través del mensaje populista del que creen
su redentor. La otra es oligarca, arrogante, corrupta,
frívola y vacía que sólo quiere
conservar sus privilegios. Pero el venezolano que
sobrevive al desempleo trabajando como buhonero.
El venezolano que muere a manos de la delincuencia,
o por falta de asistencia médica. El venezolano
que se rebusca para alimentar a su familia. El venezolano
que se siente indefenso por la falta de un poder
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