Erizo
2023 · Direction · 1.85:1 · 19 minutes
A drummer boy nicknamed “Erizo”, a general and three soldiers of the nineteenth-century Costa Rican Expeditionary Army make an anachronistic journey across the inhospitable Liberian plains in search of the Mesón Filibustero, intending to burn it down with an improvised torch. The dryness of the terrain, the lack of food and hygiene, and the fine line between the real and the fantastic will decide the platoon's fate.
Credits
| Direction | David Loynaz |
|---|---|
| Production | Natalia Quesada |
| Running time | 19 minutes |
| Aspect ratio | 1.85:1 |
| Year | 2023 |
| Country | Costa Rica |
Director’s note
“Erizo” sets out to explore the idea of myth and hero through the story of Juan Santamaría. It is a work of historical fiction that does not aim to verify the facts in detail, but to establish a connection between this myth and my own contemporary perception as a Costa Rican. What does this story tell us today? What questions does it pose? My wish was to tell a quixotic story set on the Liberian plains. In the end, thanks to a series of testimonies I found in volume 29 of the Universidad Nacional’s Revista de Historia, on the Expeditionary Army and the National Campaign of 1856, I was able to give my story a historical basis.
Juan Santamaría’s legacy is very close to us, Costa Rican citizens. And yet he is a figure present mainly in classrooms, civic ceremonies and particular programmes on national television. You could say our relationship with this myth is a precarious one, and I think that is what led me to want to explore it from a different angle. If its original function was to forge a national identity in a young Republic, I now wonder what role it plays in society today.
Ultimately, I believe my short film poses a fundamental question about how national identity is constructed and how it works in the present.
Stills — 12
