This is one of Borges's short
stories. I have been acquainted with Borges's work for a long time
and I have been very much influenced by him. He is a writer who,
when you read his books, stimulates your imagination, and he plays
around with something I very much like; manipulating the times.
The idea of filming "El Sur" (The
South) reached me through Andrés Vicente Gómez, who has the rights
to film some of Borges's stories, in collaboration with Spanish
Television. The movie will comprise eight or ten stories that will
be directed by different directors. He gave "El Sur" to Víctor
Erice, who has also been influenced by Borges. Victor wrote the
script and Andrés sent it to me along with the others so that if I
were interested, I could choose one to adapt to the screen. I read
Victor's text and I liked it very much. Then, when we were about to
start working, he called to say he wanted to do the film. And so I
forgot about the matter. However, some time later, Victor Erice
pulled out of the project and they offered it to me again. I
traveled to Argentina, to Buenos Aires, to experience the world
& environment of Borges up close. I then wrote a new script,
which respects some of Victor Erice's ideas and criteria, then I
proposed that we film it together. But Victor said that was a
different kettle of fish and abandoned the project for good.
It is a very short story of an
autobiographic nature, something which is only known by those who
have been closely acquainted with the author's life. In this sense,
obvious consequences can be drawn from it. The South is the story
of an individual who, at a given moment, has an accident that
affects his brain and he has to undergo an operation in which his
life is at stake. A sort of odyssey-like dream enters the scene in
which there is a knife fight - a subject that obsessed Borges at
different times of his life.
I took advantage of that
autobiographic content to develop the story through an actual
character who represents Borges himself as I see him. And that is
done on two levels: an imaginative one with the knife fight which
must condition and end the story, along with the real one, the
current world, dealing with the life a librarian, a shy man,
isolated and far from the maddening crowd.
CARLOS SAURA