José Asunción Silva hangs over A Poet like a specter, haunting its messy proceedings. It’s no mistake that Colombia’s most famous poet weighs so heavily. Silva’s legacy only solidified after his death; he’s a dark mirror to the film’s spiraling lead. Oscar Restrepo (Ubeimar Rios) is an out-of-control drunk. Pissing away any opportunity or safety net afforded to him, he wears his failure of a life like a badge of honor. A once-renowned poet, or at least one decent enough to publish a couple of books, Oscar now spends his days complaining through an alcohol-fueled stupor to anyone who will listen about how his genius has been overlooked, much like national hero Silva was in his time. Oscar’s life is upended when he lands a teaching gig and discovers a generational poetic talent in a young girl named Yurlady (Rebeca Andrade). Yurlady, living in the slums with her family, represents a cause for Oscar to turn his life around. If he can mentor this voice into Colombia’s next great poet, maybe he can save whatever is left of his nonexistent legacy. If only it were that simple.
For writer/director Simón Mesa Soto, A Poet was born out of his own frustrations with being a filmmaker and wondering what he had to show for it. Having made his first film, Amparo, he found himself struggling to make a living. After taking up a job as a professor, Soto began wondering what would happen if he fell down a path of bitterness and anger if his chosen career didn’t end up working out. Channeling those anxieties into his next film and transplanting the bohemian world of poetry as the backdrop, A Poet is a devastating and hilarious stumble into what it means to leave behind a legacy. Does it even matter? In a world consumed with art as capital, why not be content with having something to say, no matter who hears it?
These are the questions Soto wrestles with through crackling 16mm images of Oscar, somehow making his life even worse when you think he can’t sink any lower. A hysterical and dire look at Colombia’s patriarchal-driven class disparities, A Poet is a livewire implosion with an astonishing performance from Rios, a real-life professor with no prior acting experience. Ahead of its limited release, I saw down with Simón Mesa Soto to discuss the film.
Brandon Streussnig: In some of the reading I’ve done on the film, you’ve said you were inspired by your own struggles with filmmaking and experiences as a professor. I definitely found some of myself in Oscar with my own frustrations about art and commerce. I also found a lot of my past film professors in him. There’s that bitterness some of those guys had about not making it. Oscar is just such a familiar guy. Can you tell me about his and this film’s conception?
Simón Mesa Soto: When I made my first film, Amparo, I finished it in 2020, and it was kind of a hard moment for me because I’m also the producer of the film, director, and screenwriter. I had a struggle, almost a crisis, because it took so long to finish that film, a lot of effort. We didn’t have a big budget or anything. We were in the middle of the pandemic. We had to put the film away until the pandemic was over. I was feeling a bit frustrated because when I was in my 20s, I was reckless about cinema, I was pursuing cinema without thinking about my future or how it was going to be. But making cinema in Colombia is quite hard, it’s like being unemployed. You have to have other jobs in your free time. So, I was living as a professor. I’ve been a professor for a long time, I teach cinema.
So I was 34 or something, and I was thinking about how I had no stability. I didn’t secure anything in my life. I didn’t have a house or a car or a family or anything. At that time in your 30s, you start thinking about your stability. I started thinking that maybe I’ll just forget about cinema and just be a full-time professor and have an easy life or a more relaxing life. Then I started thinking: What kind of professor I would become in 20 years? If I failed this dream of cinema, what would be the worst version of myself? Of course, I also thought, as you said, about many professors who did some stuff in their youth, but now they’re teaching and showing the works of their youth. Maybe I might be in class, a bit drunk, or maybe I will be a bohemian or something like that.
I was afraid of that. I wanted to portray that version of myself in order not to become it. In the first versions of the script, actually, the character is more sober or serious, less comic, perhaps because at that time my idea of The Poet was not like it is now, because Ubeimar wasn’t cast. When we found Ubeimar, he changed a lot of things about the character because he’s so particular, he’s so specific. It was like a magical accident that sometimes happens in cinema. I was looking for a professional actor for a long time, and then he came, and he wasn’t an actor, but he was a very interesting option that I just found for the film. It made me change my own perception of the character.
Sometimes you think that the character is one way, and then he comes and he brings something very beautiful. He brings a lot of empathy, a lot of humor, because even though Ubeimar is not the character, I mean, his life is very different, there are still some common things, but not all of them. He does have these little details that make the character quite interesting, like the way he speaks, the way he moves, the way he runs, the way he behaves in general, and the way he recites poetry. So, that eventually changed the character of the script, not the script. The script was very much as it is, but the way he performed this character was very unique.
BS: It blew me away to find out Ubeimar was a non-actor. His performance is incredible. I love how he fits within your frames, often shrinking or hunching himself, becoming part of the environment, like wallpaper. How much of Oscar did he bring to the role?
SMS: Well, I was looking for a professional actor because in the script, the character was very demanding. I mean, lots of dialogue, lots of actions, lots of things. So I wanted to have a professional actor, but we were also casting with people from the real universe of the poetry world in Medellín to create a mixture of professionals and real characters to give this reality, this sense of documentary that we wanted. In that process, in this universe of characters, we found Ubeimar. We did a first camera test, and he was amazing because at that moment we could see how particular he was, but I didn’t do that test. It was the casting director.
Then I decided to do another test myself with him in order to try and see if he had the ability to act in a film, if he’s organic, natural, if he’s not afraid of the camera, how he reads the lines, and everything. So we did this test, and he was really good. He could do it well. But, of course, at the same time I knew I had to work with him to polish some elements and to make him understand how cinema works. So we did two months of rehearsals with him, so he could learn the specifics of acting or shooting a film. He started understanding the character and doing exercises. We kind of filmed the whole film, almost the whole film, during the rehearsals with these movements, with the other characters, to have a previous test of everything, because we were shooting on 16mm and we didn’t have much film stock, we needed to be very precise.
This moment was very important for us because it was the moment when he could feel comfortable, he could make mistakes if he wanted to, and he started realizing that he could do it, and he was an actor in a way. I could also analyze what I needed to do in order to get him where we needed him. And that’s what we did during the actual shooting. We did a lot of editing, of course, a lot of coverage for him and for other actors, so we could get the best of him. So if you see the scenes, there’s a lot of coverage of him from different angles in order to have his best performance. But at that point, he became an actor, he had a lot of security, but he also has this plasticity, if you can call it that. In his body, his body expressions, his facial expressions, the way he speaks, that’s him, that’s just Ubeimar. When you have a close-up of him, there’s just a plasticity to it. It’s all pretty much him.
BS: I like how much José Asunción Silva hangs over the film, in some cases, quite literally. He’s a great symbol of how poetry in general seems to be an art form where many of the most brilliant aren’t recognized in their time, mirroring Oscar’s own anxieties. When did you decide to focus this story on poetry instead of cinema?
SMS: It came in a very not deliberate way. I was interested in poetry long ago, because I was going to poetry readings. I knew the world of poetry in Medellín through friends and going to events. I live in this city and these people, these poets, and sometimes not even poets, but artists from this generation, are there in the cafes, in the libraries, in the cultural places. So I was interested in these types of characters, these dreamers. When I was attending these poetry readings with this generation of artists, I felt something very interesting that I wanted to portray there, but I didn’t know what or how until I was frustrated myself. When I felt like I wanted to do the worst version of myself. I thought maybe a filmmaker wouldn’t be that interesting, and that’s when I made the connection with the poets, because I thought the aesthetic of that universe, the characters were really interesting.
I mean, when you talk to a poet like that, they’re dreamers, and they see themselves as great poets like José Asunción Silva or beat poets. Also, poetry is an art form from the past. It used to be stronger in the past. Now it’s not that strong. And I think that has to do with Oscar, he’s kind of living in the past. So everything came together in a very smooth way when I thought about poets in that sense. Through a poet, through poetry, I can also speak about myself.
BS: You put a heavy focus on the ills of patriarchal society in your work. It’s the main thrust of your first film, Amparo, and here it hangs over everything. None of the men ever seem to actually care about Yurlady. The men in charge of the school only want to cover their asses, and her father is more concerned with money. What draws you to unraveling that? I know it’s universal, but is that something Colombia struggles with in particular?
SMS: I mean, it’s present everywhere. It’s been on the agenda for many years now. Everything seems to be about it in a way. So, of course, I am a man, and I wanted to talk about my own dilemmas as an artist through the character and through the conflict around how to create art, but also as a human being. It seems like, men, we are full of mistakes or issues, and the way we behave… we have to learn from that. So it’s part of us, and it’s part of myself as a man. I have to think about that in a way.
Of course, I am concerned about that. It’s part of the film because for me, the poetry, the characters, both Oscar or Yurlady, or even Efrain, are kind of a reflection of my own self and my dilemmas. For instance, I wanted Oscar, even though he’s full of mistakes and problems, I wanted him to be a novel person and a person who is trying to be a better person. Because in the end, at this point in my life, I also want to be a better person as a man, and I want to have faith in that. By having faith in Oscar, I have faith in myself in a way because cinema, for me, is kind of like therapy.
When I see my films, I see myself talking to a therapist. Many things are reflections of my own process of growing up, being a man, trying to be a better person, stopping thinking about this obsession with the future and the art, or the recognition, or making pieces with frustration and trying to find the poetry in everyday life, in the small things about life. There are many things that I see that I’m talking through them and through the characters here.
BS: I haven’t seen a film ever dissect the ways in which one can be destitute like this one. Oscar is poor, but has the means to dig himself out of this hole; it’s almost like he’s destitute out of habit. Yurlady, on the other hand, is poor because those are the circumstances she was born into. It’s fascinating because she doesn’t let that hold her down, she’s excited about one day being a mother, whereas Oscar is beaten down by his circumstances. Can you talk to me about wanting to explore that?
SMS: I think with Oscar, it’s like his pursuit of art is more about recognition, about success, or this idealization of art. I also wanted to portray this kind of machinery or merchandising of the arts, which is something I want to be far away from. My idea is not to make cinema to be part of this huge thing that pulls you far away from the core of why you are doing it in the first place. Yurlady is a way for me to find this sense of why we are doing this. Not because we wanted to be these big recognized poets or filmmakers, but because we love art and find beauty in art.
In the same way, there’s a way art works in Colombia, mainly, but also everywhere. It’s like we realize social backgrounds, social issues, and by doing that, we put these types of characters into our own art. Sometimes there’s something opportunistic about that. For instance, poverty. I don’t think the problem in Yurlady’s life is being a mother if she wants to, or to help her family if she wants to. The need to be a big poet or a great poet is more of a part of this world that puts this idealized idea of success onto her. I think it’s fine not to be recognized, it’s fine not to be a huge filmmaker or artist, as long as you have the means to live your life as you want, or have the basics. What we don’t have in Colombia is that people don’t really have the basic elements to live normally, and that’s the big problem for Colombian society and for many societies, even in the United States, to have welfare. Just the basics to survive. We don’t really need Yurlady to become a big poet if she doesn’t want to, as long as she has the basics. And for me, this is the real social issue in Colombia. Even in cinema, because it’s hard and we don’t have the basic rights or the welfare to just develop yourself as whatever you want.
This obsession with being on top or becoming the most successful — this idea also bothers me. It’s not going to make you any better or happier in a way, because at the end, what makes you happy is your life, your everyday life, enjoying the process, and those kinds of things. Again, in many ways, I’m talking about myself and my thoughts when I’m living my life. I put that there in Yurlady’s character. In Colombia, there’s a big issue with teenage pregnancy, and there are programs to reduce teenage pregnancy in the lower classes. So, there’s a way to reduce the number of girls getting pregnant there, but there’s nothing done about people in higher classes about that because that’s not really a problem to them. Being a mother is not really the problem. We tend to put the blame on the poor teenagers for that. “Don’t get pregnant because you are going to end up creating a mess for all of us.” These programs that you see around, they mean well, but this humanism is a bit fake because you’re putting the blame on them. Sometimes I think, what’s the problem with being a mother or a father as long as she wants to?
BS: I think it’s great that you’re so clearheaded about not wanting to focus on how successful your art is, you just need to get it out there. At the same time, it’s pretty special to have your film premiere at Cannes. I know that’s never the be-all and end-all, but what did that mean to you? Especially at a festival that always seems to lack South American filmmaking?
SMS: I mean, of course, it’s a film, and as a film, you have to show it in the platforms where it will expand, amplify, and reach more audiences. Cannes is a place where international cinema finds its way — it’s the place. I think it’s amazing that they saw this film and selected it because even though it talks about this art as an industry, they can also see that an interesting discussion can take place even in Cannes. For me, I’m concerned about making the films that I want to make. I mean, it’s impossible, but I try less and less to think about the outcome of the film in terms of festivals or these kinds of things. I try my best to make films that I want to make, that I enjoy making. I’ve been to Cannes before, but one thing is this idea of success, being in a festival or having many people see the film; I don’t know, I feel my life is indifferent, no matter where the film goes. I still have the same struggles or issues. It is great to be in festivals that help the film reach more audiences, and it is important for us, but for me, it’s important to think that the festival is not the end of the film. It’s just the beginning. It’s the platform to make the film reach more audiences.
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