House of Dispirit

In response to “The Mystical Isabel Allende,” by Blaise Simpson (March 27):

Rationalizing his decision to eliminate the “magic elements” in his film version of Allende’s “The House of the Spirits,” director Bille August says that “supernatural effects in a movie can look ridiculous.” Yet such effects were used wonderfully well in “Like Water for Chocolate,” a commercial hit.

But that’s minor compared to producer Bernd Eichinger’s disingenuous explanation for using a nearly all-white, all-star cast: “You need stars in this movie because the characters are bigger than life.” The filmmakers needed stars because they follow the conventional Hollywood wisdom that the moviegoing public is largely white and largely xenophobic. Were Antonio Banderas not a semi-star name, his part would doubtless have been played by Christian Slater or Emilio Estevez or whoever else is young, white and hot.

Cast member Vanessa Redgrave is also disingenuous in agreeing with this, claiming that the story’s universality is not particular to Chile, otherwise why would it be so popular? By that logic, Allende should have set her story in whatever country would appeal to the widest audience. She didn’t because she was writing about what she knew, what was in her guts, which is what any good writer does.

The truth is that August got Allende to sell out by convincing her it was necessary to strip-mine what made the book a good and popular one in the first place for fear it wouldn’t be a blockbuster. Shame on all of them.

MICHAEL LIGHTCAP

Los Angeles

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It is unfortunate that literature by Latinos--our culture, our spirituality and in this case the very way we tell our own stories--is watered down and cast in a sort of Anglo-centric point of view.

It’s always amusing to me that in Hollywood, anything with any sort of culture or sophistication must have a Eurocentric stamp of approval.

RICARDO DELGADO

San Fernando