Through Tristeza’s Eyes: The American Road Movie meets the Latin American Literary Tradition in Qué tan lejos

• In Event: Marginality, Precariousness, and Exclusion: the Latin American Road Movie

Abstract

As in traditional road movies, Tania Hermida’s film Qué tan lejos (2006) develops around a journey. In many ways this Ecuadorian film resembles those road movies from the United States that, having their roots in the Bildungsroman, depicted the growth of young culture and the atmosphere of individualism that inundated the country in the decades that succeeded WWII. Hermida’s film, however, seems closer to the Latin American literary tradition in the sense that a “simple” argument becomes highly politicized. Through a journey from Quito to Cuenca taken by three individuals¬¬––the energetic and absentminded Esperanza; the liberal and cerebral Tristeza, and the aloof and free spirited Jesús––Qué tan lejos addresses sensitive issues, one of them being the everlasting clash between Spain and Latin America. This paper discusses the direct influences of the American road movie genre in Hermida’s film, as the roads, vehicles, and landmarks portrayed denote a strong sense of youth, mobility, and desire for independence. The paper also details thought-provoking topics brought to the fore, such as the institution of marriage; radical philosophical perspectives from Novo-Hispanic poet Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz; notes from Cervantes’ novel Don Quijote with metafictional references to Hermida’s film; the meaning of a strike organized by a group of indigenous people; and policies from the “Plan Colombia” that also affected Ecuador, the country in which this Latin American road movie was produced.

Author

• Carolina Rueda, University of Oklahoma