Filmaker Amat Escalante on Life beyond the bloodshed

MEXICAN film Heli divided the critics at Cannes Film Festival earlier this year. Most of the discussion centred on the film’s graphic depiction of violence.

Yet, there is far more to Amat Escalante’s provocative movie than the disturbing scenes of bloodshed and torture that occur midway through. The film offers a poetic but also very socially conscious account of a rural Mexico steeped in turmoil as the drugs war — which has accounted for an estimated 90,000 lives — rages on around it.

“It is necessary to talk about the violence in Heli,” says Escalante, “but maybe a little too much has been said about it. When people see the film they always feel that it doesn’t seem that violent or that they don’t understand the uproar. But I’ve been very happy that Mexican audiences in particular have been able to see beyond that and understand why the violence is shown the way it is.”