Thou Shalt Not Eat Thy Neighbour On-screen cannibalism in Cannes

Nothing keeps the eyes glued to the screen better than extremes. Cannibalism crawled into cinema from the desire to shock, and the best example is Ruggero Deodato’s Cannibal Holocaust. On the other hand, it also led to fine humour in Jean Pierre Jeunet’s Delicatessen, or later, as Mrs. Lovett’s meat pies from Tim Burton’s Sweeney Todd. Another direction is the mind game thriller, like Ridley Scott’s Hannibal or David Fincher’s Se7en. Apart from that, human flesh can also be a warning: similar to the 1973 Soylent Green, this year’s film The Road tries to pull the alarm: when there will be no resources left, what will we eat? In a post-apocalyptic world where the only sweetness is canned as product placement, the answer is: each other.

However, shocking subjects can have yet another kind of potential. Somos lo que Hay, a Mexican film selected for the Directors’ Fortnight, explores the fine line between emotional drama and gore. A family of cannibals is faced with a serious problem when the father dies. One of them must now continue the killing tradition for a good cause: feeding his loved ones. “Man is the predator of man and family is the only nucleus for salvation. That is why we look straight into the ruin of mankind, which is not the loss of complex social bonds, but the disintegration of the most fundamental structure of any society, the family”, director and scriptwriter Jorge Michel Grau explains.

The plot is based on a short story by the director himself. To adapt it for both the big screen and contemporary Mexico, a lot of research was required. According to Grau: “This allowed us to understand the process by which a society allows - or provokes - these deviations”. At some point in the process, he studied the Mexican case of José Luis Calva Zepeda. In real cases like this one, it becomes obvious how shock turns into fascination. Aside from the massive press coverage, there are a lot of resources online, and even a fan site. “There is a great number of fans and followers of these cases. Most of the publications and posts I found on the Internet belong to followers, and not to researchers or scientists. Many people fall in love, to the point of marriage, with serial killers. Another interesting fact is that there is a large amount of people who collect objects that belonged to these people, such as diaries, drawings, letters”, says the Mexican filmmaker. “Calva Zepeda’s case was exacerbated by the press in my country. It not only made the front page of newspapers, but also deviated people’s attention from important political issues. It turned out everybody knew “The Cannibal from the Guerrero”, a popular neighbourhood in downtown Mexico City”.

Before defining the characters, a lot of research was made about cannibalism and religious sects. “We had long film sessions and field exercises, such as visiting slaughterhouses and morgues and watching autopsies. We were advised by a nutrition expert in order to understand the metabolism of a person who would feed himself with human flesh. Then we were trained on the use of butcher’s tools and knives”, states Grau.

To make such a film look plausible, the filmmakers went through an exhausting casting process. The director clarifies: “we searched in theatre schools, workshops, and short films to find the actors that would play the three siblings. In the end, during the last two weeks of preparation before the shooting, we did an exercise of isolation, where the actors would only have contact with me”.

After all this work, what does Jorge Michel Grau expect? “I know the film will get different reactions. It’s not only about a controversial subject, but it also touches sensitive areas of the human condition such as family disintegration. I believe it is a risky concept, as the audience may identify with the characters. However, the best prize the film could get is that the audience comes and watches it. There’s nothing better than that”, he affirms.

By Andreea Dobre