Early one Sunday morning in July 1993, artist filmmaker Lourdes Portillo received a phone call to say her beloved multimillionaire uncle had been found dead. His widow declared it suicide yet most of his family refused to believe this. Instead they cried murder, suspecting his business partner, his ranch-hand, and even the widow herself.
Returning to Mexico after living in Los Angeles since the age of thirteen, Portillo set out to investigate the circumstances of her uncle’s death. Statements are chaotic and contradictory and no two testimonies cohere. Old tales of betrayal, passion, lust, and the supernatural emerge. The unresolved mysteries and melodramatic myth-making reveal more about Chicano culture than they do his cause of death. With Chihuahua occupying a central role in the Mexican Revolution, Portillo’s film evokes the area’s heroic past and its martyrs, past and present..
Arriving at no solid conclusion, the documentary interrogates the form’s own claims to truthfulness. With one of Portillo’s first stops on her journey back to her adolescence being a movie theatre, this unambiguously self-aware essay film uses its stylized compositions to draw attention to itself, and in doing so it positions the world of journalism and the world of art at odds with one another. The performative style with which participants address the camera reveals no one statement is truly reliable. The more Portillo’s uncle is discussed, the more of an enigma he appears. Instead, the film is in the audio-visual collage of archival footage, 8mm home movies, still photography, and telenovela soap operas where emotional truths strike home.
Twenty five years after its making,the mystery remains. With the film screening at London’s Essay Film Festival, we gave Portillo a call to speak about the film and its legacy.
NOTEBOOK: What made you want to investigate your uncle’s death?
LOURDES PORTILLO: When my mother called me to tell me what happened, it seemed like it was straight out of a movie. I thought making a movie would be wonderful because it would allow me to go back to Mexico. So The Devil Never Sleeps was made in the year after his death. I had wanted to make a follow up to Las Madres [1985] with a film about Mexico and Mexican culture and this allowed me to do that. I thought I would follow all the leads and see where I get. I didn’t want to film it with the intention of finding exactly why or if he killed himself but to adventure back to Mexico. I didn’t think I could discover the truth because it was so hidden but I did envisage it being very melodramatic.
NOTEBOOK: How did your family members react when they watched the film?
PORTILLO: They were very upset because I insinuated that my uncle could have been gay and so I had to apologise to several people. I think they all had a truth in their mind, whatever it was, and that it was too painful to bear—perhaps that he killed himself and they didn’t want to talk about it like that. It just seems so intrusive and American in its directness. But I really thought it was necessary to tell that story. I had lived in the U.S. since I was a teenager and so there were some attitudes in Mexican culture I was unfamiliar with.
NOTEBOOK: How did you structure all these contradicting voices together?
PORTILLO: I wanted to show the process of making the film when you encounter exactly those contradictions. My desire was to include the doubts as well as the contradictions, the two cultures, the process of filmmaking and also the unease in which one makes a film. I wanted to show that even though it offends some people—there are always people who want the story more streamlined. Some people have said it's an investigation in which you don’t find anything out. To that I say it's not an investigation into one person but an investigation into an entire culture.
NOTEBOOK: What was so uneasy about it?
PORTILLO: Not knowing exactly where we were going. The investigation took many forms. I felt compelled to do something new and luckily I was surrounded by a very supportive crew. A lot of them were Latin Americans and have similar cultures. They often responded with joy.
NOTEBOOK: How did you reach the final form of the film?
PORTILLO: It developed slowly. In some way we decided early on that it was an allegory. So that was our structure. That could be a structure. At one point I didn't want to put myself in the film but my editor Vivian and cinematographer Kyle said I must. Working with them was a very on it was a very collective open place to play with this film.
NOTEBOOK: What language did you use to edit the film?
PORTILLO: I don’t think I really thought about language with Vivian. It’s like we are one mind. For example: we didn't compose the whole soundtrack, we got pieces of music that reminded me of something. They were dispirate not cohesive. And she would get it. It’s more like a soul mate.
NOTEBOOK: All your films investigate deaths. Are you using the medium to speak to the dead?
PORTILLO: I speak for our culture and our culture is very much about death. We laugh at it. It’s a source of entertainment. I remember my parents talking about the dead as if they were alive. We are always remembering our dead. What they did, who they were. There is no taboo. My children ask me why I am always speaking about my death. Making a film about the dead is a way of speaking to them. They are always with us in a way. It is a recognition of that presence. I could imagine it could be very strange for someone in Europe but in Mexico it’s very normal. Making Las Madres I felt very comforted with how we brought the dead children back. I feel very together with people who have passed. The Devil was a way of keeping my uncle alive. It was funny, it was deep. It would go from light to dark in the same way as our conversations did when we talked about him.
NOTEBOOK: You wrote on your website The Devil was the first film that possessed you. Did you intend for this double meaning?
PORTILLO: Yes exactly, when I make films I become possessed by the spirit of people. Same as Missing Young Woman [2001], I became possessed by the spirit of the dead girls. It was a great consolation and pleasure to be able to talk to the mothers of the dead girls.
NOTEBOOK: To me the film is more about your uncle’s widow Ofelia and her absence during the investigation. To me, she’s the missing person.
PORTILLO: And she’s dead now.
NOTEBOOK: How does it feel knowing your film is being played again and for a brief moment all these people are coming back to life?
PORTILLO: I love it. They are alive again. Gossiping. That is what telenovelas are, that’s what the film is about.
NOTEBOOK: Why did you choose to feature so many telenovela clips?
PORTILLO: They would be present in many places we would go to shoot in. We might go to shoot in a store and it would close just so people could watch an episode. They were so important to people. There would be new episodes everyday, the dramas kept unfolding. The intimate baroque style was very reflective of our process. Sometimes we would watch them and think: this is exactly the same drama as the film we are shooting. Especially the high drama with my aunt. So we wanted to feature them as well.
NOTEBOOK: Was there much true crime on television back then as well?
PORTILLO: Yes, of course. It was also very melodramatic.
NOTEBOOK: Do you ever imagine yourself making such a personal documentary again?
PORTILLO: Not at this time in my life, I don’t have the same energy I did when I was younger. I’m making small films that are based on my dream life and that seems to satisfy this drive that we have as filmmakers. I have a very lively dreamlife. I’ve always had it and I love it. They're like little films.
The Devil Never Sleeps shows on March 6, 2020 at the Essay Film Festival in London.