# Running for Bogota (1999)

### reviewed by
Steve Rhodes

    RUNNING FOR BOGOTA
    A film review by Steve Rhodes
    Copyright 1999 Steve Rhodes
    RATING (0 TO ****):  * 1/2

"They say that times change things, but actually you have to change them yourselves." -- Andy Wahrhol in the opening credits

As is well reported, Colombia is a country suffering from a wide variety of problems with the best known being the presence of the drug cartels. Director Odile Isralson's RUNNING FOR BOGOTA is a handsomely shot documentary about 2 political neophytes, both running for the Colombian Congress in 1998. One, Claudia Vasquez, is a businesswoman, and the other, Leonor Gonzalez Mina, is a popular actress and singer known as "La Negra Grande de Columbia."

The documentary consists of a series of interviews with each during their campaigns. Interspersed with these is a collection of people in the street interviews. The gist of the latter is that the people no longer trust their politicians to do what they promise. The remarkable impression that the documentary gives you is that this will no longer be a problem since these two women promise almost nothing. They run issue-free campaigns and do not appear to be running against anyone.

Both candidates talk incessantly about why they are entering politics, with self-actualization appearing to be high on the list. Although there are references to "fighting for the people," what they are fighting for what is rarely mentioned. A few times each of them comes out foursquare against crime and murder, who wouldn't, but they never say what they would do to reduce the rate of either. They are also "concerned about children" -- aren't we all?

The film has a middle and a brief ending, but the necessary introduction is truncated to a few textual visuals about the large number of Colombians who have fled the country or been murdered. Which parties are these women running as part of and what are their beliefs? We never really find out. Is the documentary meant as an indictment of the lack of relevance in politics, as seems unlikely, or is it just a confusing paean to the determination of two political novices to save their country?

Having several Colombian friends, I was looking forward to this film as a way to learn more about the country and its politics. I learned little other than the fact that people in other countries can run campaigns in which they do not give the voters a clue as to what their policies will be and still get elected.

RUNNING FOR BOGOTA runs 51 minutes. The film is in Spanish with English subtitles and in English. It is not rated but would be PG for mature themes and would be fine for kids old enough to be interested.

Email: Steve.Rhodes@InternetReviews.com Web: www.InternetReviews.com

The review above was posted to the rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due to ASCII to HTML conversion.

Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews