Pablo Larraín On His Venice Competition Title ‘El Conde’

An image of Pablo Larraín on the set of 'El Conde.' — Pablo Larraín on the 'El Conde' set. Diego Araya Corvalán/Netflix ©2023

With six feature credits in the last decade, Pablo Larraín is among the most prolific filmmakers working today, but he returns to the Lido this week with a new proposition.

El Conde, his latest feature, an inventive black-and-white satire of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, is his first film for a streamer. Larraín co-wrote and directed the film, which debuts in Competition at Venice this evening for Netflix.

“I’m happy because this movie is going to be in a lot of living rooms. It’s beautiful,” Larraín said of his work with the streamer.

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Starring his regular on-screen collaborators like Alfredo Castro and Amparo Noguera, El Conde is set in a parallel universe where fascist Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet exists as a vampire. After being ousted from power, Pinochet is now hidden in a ruined mansion on the cold southern tip of the continent. He has decided to stop drinking blood and abandon the privilege of eternal life. However, despite his disappointing and opportunistic family, he finds new inspiration to continue living through an unexpected relationship.

Veteran Chilean actor Jaime Vadell is Augusto Pinochet in the pic. The brutal dictator is still one of the most divisive figures in Chilean history. He took power 50 years ago next month, following a military coup, and across his 17-year reign, over 40,000 people faced persecution, ranging from imprisonment and torture to execution.

Pinochet’s violence and the legacy he left behind have been a constant theme throughout Larraín’s Chilean-based work. However, El Conde — his first direct tussle with Pinochet and the dictatorship — may seem like a grand departure for those who know the filmmaker from his work on previous Venice entires Jackie and Spencer.

To Larraín, very little separates El Conde from his English-language work.

“I’m a political filmmaker,” he said. “Jackie is a very political film. And Spencer, too. Politics is always in a story. Cinema can never be apolitical.”

Below, Larraín digs further into his connection to Pinochet’s legacy, how El Conde began as a TV series at Netflix, how streaming changed the way he directs, and he also teases his next English-language pic, a Maria Callas biopic, starring Angelina Jolie.

DEADLINE: Firstly, Pablo, you’re an extremely prolific filmmaker. You’ve made 7 films this decade and several TV series. How are you feeling right now?

PABLO LARRAÍN: I feel good. I feel blessed that I’m busy. This is a challenging job. It requires a lot of work, patience, passion, and love, and I still have it. I’ve been able to make movies that I care about, and that’s a good place to be in.

DEADLINE: Well, congrats on El Conde. Many of your films have discussed Augusto Pinochet in the past. Can you tell me about his legacy in Chile and how it has impacted your life?

LARRAÍN: To me, Pinochet’s legacy is divided into two main branches. First, the subsequent division that still exists in my country, where some people believe we were saved from socialism, and the pay for that was low and reasonable, which is absurd and immoral. And then some people like me understand the regime systematically committed horrible human rights violations, and that broke us. We had this figure who could act with impunity, and that impunity created a lack of healing. Today, we still haven’t reached that healing. We have not reached an agreement where we say this should never happen again.

Santiago Mitre’s last movie, Argentina, 1985, for example, is about how Argentinians found a way to gain justice. That movement created a pact where most Argentinians now know that what happened should never happen again. This lack of justice, in Chile’s case, might be eternal. And that’s the origin of this film.

DEADLINE: Earlier this year, I interviewed one of your frequent collaborators, Alfredo Castro, who plays a Pinochet associate in El Conde. You were still editing the film then, but Castro described it as your weirdest film to date…

LARRAÍN: He also said it was my most important film. I was shocked when I read that.

DEADLINE: To Castro’s point, the film is fairly experimental and explores Pinochet as a vampire, which is unconventional for a historical drama. How did you land on this narrative structure?

LARRAÍN: This is a movie that has an origin in three elements. Firstly, these famous black and white pictures of Pinochet back in the day by an Argentinian photographer. We see him wearing this cape. I was so intrigued by those images, and when I looked at them, I thought, I’m looking at a superhero of evil: What if he’s a vampire? The other thing is Jaime, who plays Pinochet. I don’t know anyone else who could play the role. He’s a precious, wonderful actor. And then the third thing is that there are no other movies or television shows about Pinochet. This is the first one. So I thought, can we do it?

DEADLINE: Why were you surprised by Castro describing El Conde as your most important film?

LARRAÍN: It’s very generous. He’s a friend and a master for me. I don’t exactly know what he meant by important. If I tried to guess, he probably saw something that I believe is true: El Conde is the end of a cycle of movies. I don’t think I’ll refer to the subject again.

DEADLINE: In the same interview, Castro identified a distinction between the films you’ve made in your home country, which all have a strong political remit and the films you’ve made outside Chile. Do you see that difference, and is it intentional?

LARRAÍN: No, I’m a political filmmaker. Jackie is a very political film. And Spencer, too. Politics is always in a story. Cinema can never be apolitical. As long as you’re describing a society, you’re making choices. Even if it’s a comedy or an action film, something that is not a political film, you are expressing political ideas through how people behave, how race and gender are exposed, and how power works. These are political visions. Jackie has an element of the American collective disturbance with violence. It’s about the assassination of a president and how his wife has to deal with it. Spencer is about a woman in one of the most powerful families in the world. And she needs to get out of there because she didn’t accept that reality. So, I understand that maybe the movies I’m making in Chile are more visibly political, but I have a perception of the world through politics that I can’t avoid.

DEADLINE: How did El Conde end up at Netflix?

LARRAÍN: I had originally thought Netflix would want to do a limited series. So Guillermo [Calderón, co-writer] and I designed the story. We wrote the first episode for a potential pilot of a four or five-episode series. We presented it to Francisco Ramos, who runs Spanish-speaking content at Netflix, who said, ‘Why don’t you make a movie?’ I said I thought you wanted television? He said, ‘No, we do everything. And this is better for a movie.’ I said of course, sure. Very good. I’ll take it. And then we wrote the script, they approved it, and we made it. I’m happy because this movie is going to be in a lot of living rooms. It’s beautiful. When I was making the film, I thought a lot about how it would be viewed on Netflix in terms of pacing, rhythm, and universality.

DEADLINE: How does being on Netflix change the way you work as a filmmaker?

LARRAÍN: When this crisis between television and cinema started a few years ago, and the streamers came on board, a lot of things were said, but the truth is, as filmmakers, we are craftspeople. We work with our hands. And if I am going to have an audience in a cinema, I know I have their senses. People’s phones will be off, I’ll have 7.1 or Atmos sound, a big screen, and a comfortable seat. As such, my timing can be different. I could use the sound space. I could be more ambiguous. I could be even slower or faster. When crafting a movie that will mostly be seen on TV, you know the experience will be different, so the craft is different. That’s the truth. You’re doing the job incorrectly if you’re unaware of where your movie might screen. And if you ignore that, then the movie will probably fail on a service like Netflix.

Alfredo Castro as Fyodor in ‘El Conde.’ (Netflix)

DEADLINE: I was recently at Locarno, where I heard the producer Daniel Dreyfus talk about his experience working with you on ‘No.’ He said it was wonderfully creative but tough to produce and secure funding because you were all so young. Is it now easier for you to make films in Chile?

LARRAÍN: A movie is always a miracle. Easy is not the right word. We have more experience, especially my brother, Juan, the producer. We have learned how to make movies. We know more. It’s never easier. You just start to understand who you are talking to. And how to put it together. But it’s always very difficult. Even the most known filmmakers struggle. It’s just a challenging medium.

DEADLINE: You’re currently one of Latin America’s most successful filmmakers. The continent has a rich cinematic history. What do you think of the Latin industry today?

LARRAÍN: Latin America is a great place for arts in general. We have to struggle with our political and economic situations compared to other societies and countries. But it’s a healthy place for cinema. Because even during the bad days, we have found ways to say what we want. Every generation has interesting voices. One of the challenges is to get past the language barrier. Spanish can be challenging for people because they’re not used to reading subtitles. We have to focus on making more universal content without losing our perspective and point of view. There’s also a way to tell the same story you want to tell and remember you’re not talking to your neighbors. You’re talking to the world.

DEADLINE: Pablo, you’re a prolific filmmaker. What can people expect from you next?

LARRAÍN: I’m making a movie about Maria Callas. So I’m preparing that. We’ll see what happens and how it comes out. I don’t know. It’s a mystery.

DEADLINE: Do you think that production will be disrupted at all by the strikes?

LARRAÍN: I don’t think so. We’re not financed by any of the studios. It’s a completely and purely independent movie. Shot in Europe. So we should be fine. We should be part of the group of films that the SAG permits to shoot.