Director Maite Alberdi feels comfortable behind a camera. With it he manages to know lives, enter into intimacies and tell stories that he would not be able to otherwise. And that is what she has done in Infinite Memory, the documentary that shows a couple who have shared 25 years together and who in the last eight years have had to deal with Alzheimer's. “I realized that I could film and also live what was happening. The camera was the best excuse to be able to enter places that I couldn't enter and intimacies that I couldn't see," the Chilean filmmaker who directed the film that was a box office success in her country, and which marked her third candidacy for the Goya awards, after La once (2014) and El agent mole (2020).
Infinite memory follows the marriage of Augusto Góngora and Paulina Urrutia. Góngora, who died in May 2023, was a prominent journalist who gained popularity at the helm of Teleanalysis, a news program opposed to the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990). In 2014 he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's, which meant a before and after in his relationship with Paulina Urrutia, an actress with an extensive career and former Minister of Culture during the government of Michelle Bachelet (2006-2010). This moving love story shows Alzheimer's from the intimacy of marriage. The daily care, having to remind someone of what he did in his life and who he was, in addition to the crises typical of a disease that today affects millions of people.
The story behind the film, which premiered at Sundance and won the award for best documentary, came into the hands of Maite Alberdi by chance. “I met them, I looked at them and I saw how they loved each other,” says the director that at first she received refusal from Góngora's family, but that they finally managed to be convinced by him. “At first, the family and Paulina didn't want to. He convinced her and now she loves the movie and she is a big promoter. She has traveled the world showing it,” comments Alberdi. "It's nice because she says that it was Augusto's decision and that she is grateful because after so many years caring for her, she returned to the world hand in hand with him. And her children – Cristóbal and Javiera Góngora – also love it. They say that it is a great movie to show your children,” adds the filmmaker who was nominated for an Oscar with Mole Agent and today is on the list of shortlisted films with Infinite Memory.
For Augusto Góngora, memory has an important place. In 1989, the journalist led the publication of The Prohibited Memory, a book that compiles chronicles during the dictatorship and that remembers some of the tragedies that occurred. “We see a man who fought for historical memory and forgets it, which is the great paradox. But at the same time he does not forget everything, that is the infinite memory, the one that remains, the emotional memory,” says Alberdi, who in December won the Forqué for best Latin American film. “He did not forget the friends he lost until the last day. And although he was not able to say what year the dictatorship was, he knew what it did to him and that is the memory that remains. He remembers Paulina until the last day although he forgets about her at times. I think that’s universal,” he adds.
The film coincides with the 50th anniversary of the coup d'état in Chile, which meant a 17-year dictatorship and where there were systematic violations of Human Rights. The film also reflects on this, since in recent years far-right groups have appeared that have sought to relativize crimes against humanity, and that vindicate the figure of Pinochet. “It is a way to maintain his legacy and tell Chile that radical right-wing views may come to say that we must contextualize and understand the violations of Human Rights at that time, but what Góngora says is that they can try to manipulate or erase history, but the pain is here and the pain of a people continues, even if you lose your memory," comments the filmmaker.
"It's like something hereditary, it's so difficult to erase the pain, and that's interesting about the discourse on historical memory that Augusto and the film has. The pain of a people remains and the loves remain. Beyond the specific details, that is the memory lesson that the film has for me,” adds the director who made her debut in documentary film with The Lifeguard (2011).
This film has just become a total success in the Andean country, even exceeding the director's expectations. “It is the most viewed documentary in the history of Chile. It was something very unexpected, I never thought that the film could be a success at the box office,” says Alberdi. In February, the film will face a great challenge at the Goya, where the director has already competed with La once and El agent mole. “La Once” was the first documentary nominated in a fiction category. That was a huge prize for us. Now, after eight years, I have managed to build a name. I have managed to make my documentaries be understood as films and I believe that La memoria infinite today arrives at the Goyas accompanied by that story,” she comments on the film that premieres on January 12 in movie theaters throughout Spain. "In total 40 countries have theatrical releases of Infinite Memory, and that is very exceptional in these times where one assumes that films are watched via streaming," says Alberdi.
