In Excess: Sergei Eisentein's Mexico - Cineclub

The material for the fi lm’s second novella, “Fiesta,” consists of: extended
footage of a bullfi ght, part documentary, part staged; a sequence
taking place in the romantic fl oating gardens of Xochimilco; documentary
footage of the celebration of the Day of the Virgin of Guadalupe;
a recreation of an old Mexican ritual that includes simulation of the
suffering of Christ; and various images of baroque churches and artifacts
in Mexico. The following novella, “Maguey,” is the only one in the fi lm
that follows a strict narrative logic: it presents a story of a rebellion by
the peons on an old pulque hacienda in central Mexico. The rebellion
is triggered by the rape of Maria, the fi ancée of one of the peons, Sebastian,
by the wealthy friends of the hacienda owner, and it results in the
death of the hacendado’s sister and a particularly cruel execution of the
rebellious peons.
My choice to read these two episodes together, although there is
no doubt that they were intended as separate novellas, stems from the
following reasons. First, the intended order of the sequence of the two
episodes is unclear: in some versions of the libretto “Maguey” follows
“Fiesta,” but in others the order is reversed. 3 We know from Eisenstein’s
notes that he considered intercutting the shots of the execution of
Sebastian from “Maguey” with the scenes depicting religious ecstasy in
“Fiesta,” thus breaking the autonomy of the two novellas. Although this
parallel cut was not included in any of the reconstructions of ¡Que Viva
Mexico! it would provide a very important juncture between the two
episodes, allowing for an explicit connection between sadism/masochism
and religious ecstasy. This chapter will pursue this juncture further.
Both novellas take place at the same time in Mexican history (during
the Porfi riato, the reign of the dictator Porfi rio Diaz). Both episodes also
serve as a direct illustration of the premise in Brenner’s Idols Behind Altars
regarding the permanence of the indigenous culture and rituals behind
the Spanish colonial ceremonies and customs, both of which are marked
by a baroque excess.
Finally, stylistically, the two are constantly linked by the visual motif
of punctures: the picador in the bullfi ght sequence, the self-infl icted
wounds of the Christ imitators, and the puncturing of the maguey plants.
The visual motif of puncture into the fl esh also serves as a link between
the theme of sadism/masochism/cruelty and religious ecstasy.
What marks “Fiesta” and “Maguey” are the particular kinds of cruelty
depicted, a cruelty that verges on sadism and masochism; we see this in
the bullfi ght, in the religious ceremonies, in the treatment of the peons,
and the homoeroticism in the representation of the male body. Both the
cruelty and the homoeroticism are linked to the experience of ecstasy:
“going all the way” : 91