Chacabuco: A Cinematic Palimpsest of Memory

• In Event: Journalism, Media, and the Memory of the Past in Film

Abstract

The site of Chacabuco in Chile is the place of a former nitrate mine, but was also a concentration camp used by General Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorial regime. As a site, Chacabuco has been scripted and re-scripted according to the needs of the present day: a nitrate mine during the 19th century, a concentration camp during the 20th, it is now a memory site as the Chilean population continues to heal from the wounds of its violent past. Chacabuco is unique as the only concentration camp of which we have live film from the time it was operational – footage captured clandestinely by German filmmakers Heynowski and Scheumann. Perhaps due to this legacy Chacabuco has been chosen repeatedly by contemporary filmmakers for representation on the big screen.

This presentation will re-consider historical scenes of the operational camp included in Heynowski and Scheumann’s Yo fui, yo soy, yo seré, as well as the use of contemporary footage of the site in the documentaries Chacabuco, memorias del silencio, Memoria desierta, and Nostalgia de la luz. I will argue that the use of Chacabuco in these films demonstrates how Chacabuco as a space is a palimpsest, scripted anew with each representation in order to fit each filmmaker’s vision, while, at the same time, the space itself forces the filmmaker to tread precariously among the past inscriptions of the site that continue to speak from the ruins, revealing the still and continuously emerging silenced past of the space.

Author

• Megan L Corbin, West Chester University