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In October of last year, I brought my dear wife and filmmaking partner, Lindalee Tracey to hospital. She was suffering through the last, painful stages of cancer. During each of Lindalee’s final days in palliative care, Ariel Dorfman sent me a poem which I read to her. Poems by the Persian poet, Rumi and by Ariel himself. So Lindalee slipped away with Ariel’s and Rumi’s lovely words swimming in her mind.
Ariel was traveling to Chile just a few weeks after Lindalee’s passing. Though I was still very much in shock and mourning and having difficulty functioning, I felt compelled to go with Ariel and make this film. Lindalee had been so supportive of this project and would have wanted me to go. So, while Ariel had his “promise to the dead” – to those dear companeros who were brutally killed in Pinochet’s military coup 33 years before, I, too, had very personal promises to keep.
We are optimistic that A Promise to the Dead: The Exile Journey of Ariel Dorfman, premiering in this year's Real to Reel, will follow a similar path and provoke lively debate and discussion at theatrical and TV venues around the world. Though we live in “the Americas”, we know so little about the lives and experiences of our brother and sisters in the southern hemisphere.
[pictured: Ariel Dorfman (left) with Peter Raymont]
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