MACHUCA : A Film By Andres Wood

I wanted to recommend this brilliant Chilean film that I saw the other night, MACHUCA, it is basically the only movie I have ever seen that shows the truth of Class War from the point of view of grade school students, a story of a school kid growing up in Santiago when Salvador Allenda was in power and shortly after removed by the CIA backed military junta of Augosto Pinochet,  and the repercussions on the poor after Pinochet took power .

This film shows the massive chasm that lies between the haves and the have nots of Santiago in the early 1970's, which could really be any place or town or city or nation, in Europe, North, Central or South America, today, showing, El Barrio of New Brunswick with its poverty and desolation and less than two miles away, the sparkling estates and condominiums of South Brunswick, or North Brunswick, or perhaps taking you from the yuppie splender of Park Slope to the bleak ghettoes of Bedford Stuyvesant, and the fight for social and economic equality by those who opposed such a inequality and the radical changes brought about by  socialists like Salvador Allende, whose legacy has, I believe, sparked the massive move towards socialism and socialist governments in modern Latin America, with Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, former Roman Catholic Bishop and political prisoner, Fernando Lugo, in Paraguay, a student of "liberation theology" (which is often termed  "Christian Marxism" by its detractors due to its emphasis on the fight for the poor and social justice), and Evo Morales in Bolivia, the first indigenous leader to become a president of Bolivia, when he was elected in a massive landslide of 53.7 % of the popular vote (the largest electoral victory in Bolivian history) on December 18, 2005, only to substantially increase this majority in a recall referendum on August 14, 2008, where he won more than two thirds of the votes, and again won the presidential elections in December 2009 with a 63% majority in tbe national vote.

This movie teaches the timeless lesson of Class War and even focuses on proponents of "liberation theology", in this movie, in the form of a rebel priest, who is shown as being either socialist or very sympathetic to socialist ideas, Father McEnroe, who is allegedly based on the historical rebel priest, Father Gerardo Whelan, who was the priest who taught at the school that this film's director, Andres Wood attended, Saint George's College, a rebel priest who stands up against the wealthy "elite" and their fascist backers. Great film and a recommended film for any socialist or anyone who understands the importance of Class War in *any revolutionary struggle*

-- Rory Dubhdara, The New Brunswick Bolshevik