Terror latino-americano : os crimes da ditadura guatemalteca a partir das lentes de Jayro Bustamante

Abstract

This article analyzes the feature film The Weeping Woman (2019), written and directed by Jayro Bustamante. Inspired by real events and characters, Bustamante mixes drama and horror in order to denounce the indigenous genocide that occurred in Guatemala in the 1980s. The film emphasizes the trial process of Efraín Ríos Montt, accused as the main person responsible for the massacre, and the effects of the extermination policy on the Mayan descendants in Guatemala. Through cinema, Bustamante discusses a past whose marks stand the test of time; a past that, effectively, haunts Guatemalans. In view of this, this text works with Public History in dialogue with the present time. To this end, the article uses social horror, an expression of professor and researcher Laura Loguércio Cánepa. Thus, the aim is to show how the conventions of the horror genre can contribute to the presentation/discussion of Latin American ills. Certainly, The Weeping Woman (2019), is more than just a ghost/spirit story. It is, above all, Guatemala mourning its dead and missing.