When the Copywriter is the Protagonist : History and Intermediality in Pablo Larraín’s No (2012)

Through films such as Tony Manero (2008), Santiago 73, Post Mortem
(2010), and No (2012), the productions of Chilean director Pablo Larraín have
focused on the historical and political themes that marked the last decades in the
life of his country: the putsch against Salvador Allende and Augusto Pinochet’s
dictatorship. This paper analyses the last film of the trilogy, dedicated to the 1988
Chilean national plebiscite and the communication battle between supporters
of the “Yes” and “No” sides. Why does Larraín identify the copywriter René
Saavedra as the main character of the film? And why does the film accord such
importance to the advertising campaign in recounting the historical reality of
democratic transition? How does the fictional film remediate the archival footage
of the 1988 campaign? To answer these questions, this paper investigates the film
as an audiovisual form of interpretation of historical events and film montage
as an intermedial “authentication” of the archival documents relating to this
traumatic past.