Interview with Lucía Puenzo, Inés Efron and Emme, director and protagonists of El Niño Pez

Sandra Commiso brought together for the Clarín newspaper the filmmaker Lucía Puenzo and the actresses Inés Efrón and Emme, to unravel the secrets of The Fish Boy.

After passing through the BAFICI and its recent commercial premiere, the young woman's second film Puenzo addresses the relationship between a teenager and a Paraguayan maid who works at home, who are involved in a mysterious crime. The plot intertwines different genres, from the police to road movie elements, to unleashing in a grand finale.

The acting duo made up of Inés Efrón and newcomer Emme contributes a great job to sustain a climate of great general tension. Throughout the note, the director and actresses review the personality of the characters, the relationship between them, Emme's film debut, of taboos such as incest and the Guarani legends that appear in the film.

La Full interview, then:

The characters of Lala and La Guayi keep so many secrets that one never finishes discovering what they are like, also because they seem to be guided only by passion and never by reason ...
Lucy:
Totally. I think that the presence of the legend of the fish boy in the lake, everything related to water and what is below the surface, is linked more to the emotional than to the rational, it is something very of the feminine world. And the meeting of the two is from that place, where they all mix: their relationship is erotic, maternal, friendly. They are surpassed by the bond. In addition, I was interested in accompanying Lala by the hand, I did not want the viewer to know more than her, but to be on a par in the confusion. Because when there is more distance, one tends to judge the characters and I was not interested in having a distant look, judging them. Yes, to be able to understand them. The two of them have very heavy secrets and yet it was important that they were not pointed with the finger and could be loved even if it was uncomfortable.
Emma: For me the most important thing was that, to understand what La Guayi was like and not judge her. I think the only reason that guides them both, which is their reason for being, is the love they feel.
You had a strong character to make your film debut, how did you approach it?
Emma: With Inés we take great care to build the bond between the two. From the first time I read the script, I imagined La Guayi: little girl, in Paraguay with her world; fragile and strong at the same time. She follows her instincts and leaves alone with her body, which is the only thing she has: it is her house, her prison and her weapon as well. With Lala, in a way, she allows herself to be the mother that she couldn't be and the one she couldn't have. That is why the bond is so strong, beyond the erotic. And their worlds end up looking alike.
Agnes: It's that Lala, who apparently has everything, ends up feeling lonely. But later she discovers herself and even I am amazed at what she is capable of doing. I was understanding it little by little; also I understand 50 percent of a character when I see the movie, always.
And what did you find out about Lala?
Agnes
: I couldn't believe that I had put my body to all that!
Lucy: Lala is a heroine, she even dares to face the shots! (laughs)
He is a character that undergoes a great transformation ...
Lucy:
Yes, even in the scene where she cuts her hair, she does it for real and we had to film thinking about before and after that moment. For Inés it was like two shootings.
Agnes: From there, there is a break and Lala becomes masculine, acquires more strength. It's as if a weight is lifted off your shoulders. And it is also symbolic because her long blonde hair marks her social level.
In the film, the incest taboo is directly alluded to, how did they work on it?
Lucy:
Incestuous ties are so common in Latin America, the number of cases is infinite, they are even accepted, or they remain sotto voce, unfortunately they are not a rarity. It is curious that it has not been discussed more in the cinema, except in a few cases or indirectly.
But in your film, that taboo hovers over everything.
Lucy:
Yes. Between fathers and daughters there are two very symmetrical links between girls and their respective fathers. In reality it has to do with this very symbiotic relationship between them, which becomes mirrored. In addition, I wanted to draw an ambiguous profile of those parents, to remove them from the stereotype. They are sinister beings but they can be seductive at the same time, that is the most disturbing thing about them.
Arnaldo André plays the father of La Guayi, did you think directly of him for the character?
Lucy:
Yes. In the novel there was a brother instead of a father, but then I decided to change and spoke with him. When Arnaldo accepted, I rewrote it for him, thinking of a leading man outside his stereotype. It is very interesting what he did.
These relationships are also marked by power and drive crime.
Lucy:
I worked a lot on power relations, especially inside the house. Many times, in certain relationships, one believes that things are one way and in reality they are the opposite. La Guayi is the one who actually, despite being the maid, the one who handles the threads of the house. When, at a family dinner, he sings in Guaraní, he does not do it innocently.
In the midst of that sordidness and darkness with which the characters face, there is also a dream world, of legend that functions as a refuge.
Lucy:
Something like that. Lala's trip to Paraguay is like a spiral that unravels, it is almost symbolic, in search of the legend that they created for themselves. In that place, next to Lake Ypoá, the boundary between the real and the imaginary is blurred.


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