Bruno Santamaria’s Things We Dare Not Do feels less like a documentary and more like an expressionist painting come to life. There is a languid beauty to it that is somehow feels both incredibly precise, yet totally ephemeral. Being that Santamaria comes from a background of being a professional cinematographer, it shouldn’t be surprising that he knows how to perfectly capture an image on to film.
But this isn’t simply a documentary of gorgeous visuals.
I had the opportunity to speak with Santamaria over the phone, me in Chicago, he stuck in Europe due to Covid. We chatted about the filmmaking process, how violence can manifest itself in many invisible ways, how friendship can make good art, among other things.
While some editing was made for the sake of clarity, these were kept as is to respect the choices of the filmmaker and friend of the subject.
Film Cred: I had the chance to watch Things We Dare Not Do as part of the Chicago International Film Festival, and I was really, really blown away by it for a lot of different reasons – from the subject matter, to the visuals of the film, to just being curious about the process of making it. I know that making documentaries is a long and winding process. How did you start on this one? Because it’s a very personal story and seems like something I wouldn’t expect a documentarian from the outside of that community to be able to make.
Bruno Santamaria: Yeah, you’re right. I think it happened like that because at the beginning I was living at my mom’s house, trying to feel comfortable. I started writing memories to find a project – memories from my childhood. And I realized that all those memories had something in common, they were all about relationships. Especially with identity and sexual identity. Then I realized I wanted to do something about that relationship, a secret, something that keeps you from doing something you want to do in life. And because of that, I got the title, Things We Dare Not Do. It’s strange cause the first thing I did when I left my mother’s house was go on a trip with a friend, and there I met a lot of children. One of them told me a funny story about a man dressed as Santa Claus who fly around and would throw candy to the kids. Because of that, I fell in love completely with this island. It was a combination – I wanted to stay on this island to see if Santa Claus exists, and because I didn’t want to be in my house. So I stayed there for three years, more or less. I started to meet the people, because while I was there I taught lessons in video, did things in the school, showed cinema in the main basketball place… So I did a lot of activities, and in the process, I met all the community. All the kids, the mothers, fathers, grandfathers. And during the process I, I don’t really know how to say it, matched with some family? So I stayed with them, and I was able to talk to them about things I was not able to talk about with other people. That I had a boyfriend for three years… I started saying this, in this house in the middle of nowhere, because two sons in this family were gay. It was very strange in a way because this was a very small community and also very conservative. So I felt very comfortable talking about all these things in this house. One night I was talking to the mother of these kids and she tells me that she thinks the worst thing that can happen to a mom is to understand that her sons have kept secrets from them. And she was saying that she thinks I should talk to my mom about my boyfriend. And I gave you this very long story because I think that talk with the mom of one of these guys was overheard by one of these guys – and that was Dayanara [Nono].
After that Dayanara came to me, we had been friends for two and half years, and he talked to me and told, “Yeah, my mom knows I’m gay, but honestly, I’m not gay. I feel like a woman. I want to dress like a woman.” And it was at that moment we understood that we had a secret in common. From that moment the movie appeared in some way – in this atmosphere, with all these kids trying to figure out how they can grow up on this island. In this process of growing, Dayanara told me that she was trying to come out – again. To tell her parents that she wanted to be a woman.
So I think it’s a very personal and intimate movie – even according to the people involved. But we were living a very similar situation and they know me not just as a cameraman and director, they know me in the community. That’s the reason we were able to be so close with each other.
FC: That makes sense, because the intimacy between the camera and the subjects is very palatable. It’s obvious that it isn’t a complete outsider. Because the film is incredibly beautiful, and it’s far more cinematic than a lot of documentaries. And to me that seems to come from focusing on wanting to tell the story more than show the story.
BS: Yeah.
FC: How much did your experience as a professional cinematographer come into play with this?
BS: I think a lot, because being a cinematographer is a way to protect yourself and to be silent most of the time. I usually don’t know what to say to people. So if I have a camera I don’t have to say anything.
FC: Right.
BS: I think that being a cameraman, doing cinematography, is a tool of protection. But also I wrote a lot of rules about the images. For example, what time we shoot, what kind of lenses, what kind of movements, what level of height to be at so that we’re at the same height as the child… When we were filming I put all my attention into being there and trying to interact and to listen or talk if necessary. All this with the camera with me and filming, but not bringing too much attention to the filming. So in some ways, I’d be able to catch what was happening between people but taking care of the image with the rules that we put before.
FC: There were moments where I was watching the film that I honestly forgot that I was watching a documentary. It felt like I was watching a narrative fiction film that had a verite style to it. Because there was such a naturalness between you and Arturo especially. I’m thinking specifically of the scene where she is speaking to her parents, and to her father specifically, about wanting to dress publicly as a woman, and you capture that single tear falling down her face as the father sits there in silence. And it almost feels scripted – not to take away from the moment – but in the way that you shot it, which was so very, very immersive in a way that not many documentaries get. Were you trying to pull the audience into the community in your filming?
BS: In what way? What do you mean?
FC: Many documentaries are so much about informing the audience – putting something on the screen to see. This one felt like you were trying to pull the into the film…
BS: Yes. Exactly. For me, and the other people who made the film, we tried to make people feel what the experience was of being so close there while filming. Also to make people feel emotionally what it is to stop keeping a secret. What it means to grow up, in some way. It was more about trying to make people feel something than trying to inform. We put a lot of attention to the sequence with the energy of the kids, and the silence of Arturo, for example. So you’re absolutely right.
FC: The immersion of the film is very real. Another part where I felt that was when everyone was outside at a public dance and there’s a shooting. There’s a very tangible sense of fear and shock. As a filmmaker, what was going through your mind when you were filming that? Because you were there just to film a dance.
BS: Yeah, yeah, it was completely horrible in that moment. It was an accident that interrupted everything. It interrupted the party, it interrupted the filming – of course, the lives of the kids who were there. In the moment we all threw ourselves to the floor and trying to see if we could run because there was shooting in the air. When we got back to the house where we were living we were so afraid, but the father of the family was saying, “Don’t worry, nothing is going to happen.” But the father was saying I still have to go to work. So the daughter kept trying to tell him, “No, no, you don’t have to go to work right now.” And he said, “Yes I do, because nobody is going drain the nets of the fish and a crocodile is going to eat them, and who’s going to pay for that? I have to go.”
It was so hard for me to listen to that, that after a shooting he still has to go to work. The next day people go into the streets and talk about this, of course, and they were so shocked. They may never forget this. But they also go and clean the blood for the next celebration. Not exactly for the next day, but they start continuing their life. So we experienced it, and what we tried to do with the film was make it feel like that same situation. The film is about someone telling a secret to their parents, but in the middle of this a shooting happens that stops everything for a one moment. And after that moment they still have to continue on.
FC: Did you have any reservations on how much of the violence you wanted to put in the film? Because it wasn’t part of the story you were trying to tell.
BS: Yes, uh-huh. We were dealing with this, the shooting, in editing because… How can I say it… Mexico is a violent country. A lot of these rural places, these little towns, are violent. It’s something terrible about the country. So when I went to this town I understand that, but after living there I saw another kind of violence… there are no adults on the island. There are no adults because they are working all day. All day, seven day a week, 31 days a month. They also don’t have too much water. There is also a lot of homophobia and transphobia. There are many kinds of layers of violence. In the beginning, and also during the editing, we were trying to balance all those layers of violence.
In the beginning, when we were trying to get funds, the violence of death was so present… What we were trying to do was show all these different kinds of violence, but without hiding the things that were always present.
FC: That makes sense. Because Dayanara was already out as gay to the family, but not as transgender yet. Were they out to the community? Because there is a scene where Dayanara is dancing in the square and off camera you hear someone screaming homophobic slurs at them. That made me very worried for them at that moment. Was it known to everyone, or was it still a secret between the family and the community?
BS: Now it’s not a secret. Now she’s working in Tijuana, at the border of Mexico. And at the company they are a girl.
FC: Wonderful!
BS: Her coworkers call her Dayanara. But the thing is, from her house to her work she can’t go dressed as a woman. It’s too dangerous. There is a lot of transphobia. So we tried to film a little bit of her putting makeup on her face, but even that’s enough to get violent homophobic and transphobic shouts. Especially with men, because the culture is like that. But now that she’s out to her friends, and out to the world, that means she has to be so much more careful. It’s not easy to be like that.
FC: I can’t begin to imagine that experience in the community where she’s from. I’m Cuban and Colombian, so I definitely understand the machismo that is in latinx culture. And Mexico seems to have it even a little bit more than even those countries.
BS: Yeah, yeah.
FC: So has the community seen the film yet?
BS: Just Dayanara. The whole community, no, but we showed them a lot of sequences during the three years of shooting. I was showing them fragments on the basketball court because they really enjoyed it. But the finished, edited movie, they haven’t seen that because of COVID. We had planned to show in March, but then everything closed. So no, just Dayanara. She saw the movie about two months ago, and it was a very lovely experience. It was really nice.
FC: Did they enjoy it?
BS: Yeah! She enjoyed it too much! Because now that she’s living in Tijuana it brought back a lot of memories of seeing everything. She was so touched being able to see herself at that moment that was very intimate. I think she was so touched by the film, but also by the reaction of everyone who did see the movie.
FC: I really hope this gets picked up for a wider release after the festival circuit. Because it speaks to a topic that is, I don’t want to say controversial but is in the news a lot right now – gay rights and trans rights. This story is presented in a very honest way. It doesn’t feel like it’s an agenda behind it – even though you are trying to show things in a warm way.
BS: Right…
FC: Are you looking to do any more with Dayanara? Maybe following up?
BS: What I was thinking, and it came from an idea from Zita Erffa, our sound girl and my very close friend… I was with her a few weeks ago and we were thinking that Dayanara is so very intelligent and sensitive and is now in Tijuana, and she loves makeup. She loves makeup and studying all kinds of makeup things, so we’re trying to push her to be a makeup girl in cinema. It could be really great! And I was talking to friends who do non-documentary films and thinking she could maybe start as an assistant. We were so impressed when we went to show her the movie a few months ago because in 20 minutes she went from no makeup to looking really, really great! We were really impressed by that and I think she’d be great. I don’t know if she wants to act, but I know that she’d be fantastic at makeup.
FC: That’d be a wonderful epilogue to her story. You tell her story via cinema and in the end, she becomes part of cinema. That’d be so beautiful and poetic.
