Interview: Adriana Barraza

You would think that her intrinsic understanding for the character she plays and consequently, commanding screen performance that she delivered meant that Alejandro González Iñárritu only had her in mind for the role of Amelia, but unlike her costar Gael Garcia Bernal (with whom she has been paired with on a second occasion) the Madre of Mexico’s New film wave still needed to do prove that the role was a right fit for her. Talking to her (via phone and helpful interpreter) I got a sense that while the accolades at this time of the year are pleasant, that this was the sort of rare lifetime role that as the saying goes “comes once in a blue moon”.

Back at a time when the Babel was in its infancy stage, Adriana Bazzara was busy filming, difficult to reach and in Argentina. I could tell in the actresses’ bubbly voice and in the enthusiastic mélange of Spanish and English languages that she counts her lucky stars thankful that Iñárritu was persistent in locating the actress, lucky to read and record herself for the part, and was ultimately blessed in what was the best pre-birthday gift: getting the part.  

Some might have trouble recalling her secondary role in Iñárritu’s first part of the thematic trilogy with Amores Perros –  Bazzara played the mother of the two brothers at odds. Five years later with Babel, she incarnates the role of a nanny (Amelia) illegally crossing into Mexico with two American children. Her character suffers through a harrowing, nightmarish experience. This is a psychologically demanding role, pitting a migrant nanny against extreme conditions and the vacuum of helplessness that Amelia and the film’s fellow journeymen must have been a professionally stressful and exhausting one.

At 49 years young, Bazzara (and fellow co star Rinko Kikuchi) are this year’s rookie additions to the more than a dozen year-end, “best of” races. Bazzara admitted to me that she cried of joy when she got the part – logically she shouldn’t be done with the tissues just yet.    I was keenly interested in knowing how the actress prepared for her role, and more specifically, the headspace she had to be in for such an emotionally and physically taxing role. Her response: an amalgamation of 36 years worth of working on plays, television and other feature films, but in addition to her wealth of experience – she also added some research to her tool box. Bazzara was adamant in highlighting that there is an “Amelia born everyday”, meaning the perils of the Mexican border crossing nightmare is more than just a news headline, it’s a horrible daily reality. While her character’s narrative arch doesn’t empathetically reference the entire illegal immigrant storyline, it treks down in a visual sense the kind of journey that no person should consider. Frequent discussions with Iñárritu on character motivations made a sequence such as the nerve-racking re-entering at the border patrol was thought out and the immigrant experience came about by Bazzara’s own research. She spent some time with a woman that had undergone such a traumatic voyage.
  

Bazzara prides herself in being a disciplined actress (the press notes claim that she took the Bridget Jones route and added some pounds) and when asked if she lifted potato bags in order to prepare for scenes where she had walked under a blistering sun with child in tow, she said that Alejandro had her practice with the weight of a camera instead. Together the filmmaker and actress zoned in on the physical performance and were concerned with the look, the posture, and the distress in those eyes of hers. One of the pluses of working with a director like Iñárritu is that the filmmaker places an importance on character growth and surmounting tragedy – everything dealing with her character was filmed in sequential order keeping the harrowing finale of Amelia at the end of Bazzara’s tenure.    

Some might wonder why the actress enjoys the somewhat masochistic roles – in her first collaboration she plays a mother of Octavio – and ends up losing 2 sons in the process, in Babel she is dealt the unfair hand of a nanny who makes a simple error in judgment and loses everything that she has worked dearly for. There aren’t too many happy endings in this new wave of homemade stories from filmmakers – (this includes the Carlos Reygadas and Alfonso Cuaron). When asked whether Alejandro is making some sort of symbolic correlation between the mother and that of Mexican society (motherland), Bazzara states that it isn't necessarily a criticism of Mexican society but rather a depiction of, and a heighten sense of: realism. 

Recently honored as part of Palm Springs International Film Festival’s award for Ensemble Performance and mere hours away from the Golden Globes, Bazzara’s trouble at finding a new dress is one of the many pleasurable inconveniences and like a kid in a candy store, she is looking forward to ‘respectfully’ and ‘politely’ asking for some Kodak moments with the Meryl Streeps, Judi Denchs, and the Helen Mirrens of the evening. I know who I’ll be routing for not only for that evening but for the very special one in mid-February. 

Babel is still playing in select theatres.