Que Viva Mexico!

The film Que Viva Mexico! we are taken into the lives and culture of the Mexican people.  Einstein went through a difficult ordeal to make this movie and did not even get to finish it himself.  The honesty and realness of the film is moving to the viewer.  The raw footage of the film makes it difficult to truly know how Einstein would have wanted to film to eventually become (Hart, Que Viva Mexico!) The film making was well done but is the historical aspect accurate? 


The chapter entitled, ‘The Maguey Cactus’, shows historically accurate instances of laborers mistreatment by the hacendado’s and his men.  According to the document, The Course of Mexican History, the rape of Maria was a common occurrence on the haciendas.  The tragedy is that Maria’s husband to be, Sebastian, is executed in a brutal was because he was trying to rescue her and take revenge for her rape.  Meyer’s states that these crimes were committed but were almost impossible to prove.  Einstein gives the viewer another example of the oppression of the lower classes that eventually led to the revolution. 


In the final chapter of the film on the Mexican tradition of The Day of the Dead, Einstein uses an interesting device to show the eventual decline of the elite.  He shows different individuals removing their skull masks, some revealing a smiling young face and others revealing the skull of the elite.  According to Stephen M. Hart in his article Que Viva Mexico! this is representative of a dying class.  The elite were doomed and the laborers and lower class were ready for a revolution.


The historical aspects of this film are accurate. Einstein made a point to accomplish that. The point of his film would have come across better if he had been able to finish it but all in all it comes across well.