Interview Christián Jiménez Director of Bonsái

Bonsai is based on a famous novel. How did you manage to make this material your own?

It was not something that I intended to do when I first read the novel. At some point making a film out of it just came to me as a possible Idea. I don’t think that adapting is completely different from writing your own material. You always have some kind of source, which can be whatever - life, ideas - and then you always have to struggle with your source and transform it into something that is like the map of your shooting, which is the screenplay. The struggle is similar, you always have to adapt from somewhere. Because I’ve been really busy with Bonsai, I haven’t really been working on a new project, but I have got two treatments that might develop into films eventually.

When did you decide you wanted to become a director?

I was interested in films since my early twenties. But becoming a director felt a bit hard to grasp, hard to get there. I decided to give it a serious go when I was in my late twenties, when I started to make films in a professional way, short films. It was a bit hard, especially because I had already gone to university and I did study something else. I could not call my dad and tell him: “Look I need five years of support”. I had to kind of manage to do the whole thing and keep leading a normal adult life. I guess I was pretty lucky, this thing went well and now I am here.

What job did you do before becoming a full-time director?

I worked at the Aids National Commission in Chile. I was in charge of writing the questions for the national survey of sexual behaviour, about everything that was related to aids. Then I worked for television in London for three years, which was my only real job, where I was really working full-time. And afterwards, since I have become a filmmaker, I’ve still done things on the side, like teaching and writing a sitcom for television.

Is there a certain director you admire the most?

Many. I don’t have one single favourite director or one favourite film. There are times when I get kind of obsessed with different directors, so I had like my Kubrick period, I had my Kaurismäki period, Fassbinder period, Wes Anderson one. Lately I am into Hal Ashmead, an American director from the ‘70s. I really like a lot of films. I like even silly films. I like comedies. Even in the most stupid comedies there is always something I can enjoy.

Your two features were shot in Valdivia, a small city in Chile. Would you be interested in shooting abroad?

Eventually, why not? We have a project at a very early stage that takes place in Europe. It involves an American girl and a European guy. Something I would consider doing when the right moment comes, which is not so soon I think. I think there are many stories to be told in my country. It’s a great opportunity to be able to tell them. I come from the south of Chile and there isn’t really a film tradition there. So in a way the chance to kind of build up something from scratch is interesting. When people watched my films in my hometown, they left the cinema and they walked through the same streets they were watching in the film, and that’s something great I think. The feeling that with your films you are part of a community and you can give something back to the community is very important to me. People can look at themselves in a way. Right now shooting in the south of Chile, even when the projects are in a way smaller, is a bit like an opportunity, like a responsibility and actually a real pleasure to me. So I’m not looking to leave but rather to explore further this world that I know very well and that I’m discovering through the films I’m making of the city.

Any particular wish for the future?

Something I really hope to achieve is to have a wider audience in Chile. It’s really complicated right now, because multiplexes dominate the distribution in such a heavy and brutal way, so that is something I see as a goal being in Cannes, to reach a wider audience.

By Lukas Traber