Keswick Film Festival

Synopsis

‘Even the Rain’ shows a film company arriving in Bolivia to make a film about Columbus arriving in America and starting the exploitation of native Americans. The trouble is that the film company starts off by exploiting the locals in the same way Columbus had. Their mistake is to hire Daniel, who turns out to be a local leader in the fight against privatisation of the water resources; the ‘double storyline’ is set. (We are in 2000 when there was a genuine fight against Bechtel Corp, who lost their battle to charge the locals for water.)

Our film has good credentials; it was written by Ken Loach’s screenwriter Paul Laverty (and, indeed, the director Icíar Bollaín appeared in Loach’s ‘Land and Freedom’). ‘Their point is that exploitation, inequality and misplaced ideals cross the centuries, but so too do smart, disenfranchised folk willing to take a stand.’ - Dave Calhoun, Time Out. We last saw Bollaín as director of ‘Take My Eyes’ (2005 Festival). Let’s hope she has learnt the lesson of history but, as Roger Ebert pointed out - ‘I looked in vain for a credit saying, “No extras were underpaid in the making of this film.”