Dominican Filmmaker Nayibe Tavares-Abel Talks Ambitious Berlin Doc ‘Colossal’: ‘Stories Like This Need to be Seen’
A family lineage of civil duty is marred by electoral unrest in “Colossal” (“Colosal”), the debut feature from Dominican filmmaker Nayibe Tavares-Abel which will world premiere in Berlin as part of the fest’s Forum program.
The history of the Dominican Republic’s elections is one for the textbooks, though what’s previously made it to print is far from the reality of those involved in attempting to bring a democratic approach to the process. Through intimidation, propaganda and violence, those seeking to champion change were often relegated to fall in line.
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In May 1990, lawyer Frolián Tavares, the director’s grandfather, found himself at the center of such scandal after he was appointed chair of the electoral commission. He sought to provide dogged oversight and a fair outcome but was accused of fraud and assisting in the highly-contested victory of Joaquín Balaguer, a successor of Rafael Trujillo and his dictatorship.
“‘Colossal,’ is a personal story because my family was involved, but it’s also the nation’s history,” Tavares-Abel told Variety. “For a long time, the people in power were very active in trying to hide that part of our history. With our film, that’s something we wanted to push forward, that part of history that the people who abuse power don’t want us to understand. There are so many places in the world where stories like this need to be seen.”
She spent time trying to rationalize the statements she saw in the press with the first-hand accounts of her loved ones, setting out on the highly ambitious trek towards documenting the past while surveying the present.
“The story about my grandpa’s alleged involvement in this cultural fraud is something I heard about when I was very young. In high school, I remember it being talked about in history class,” she admitted. “The very first impulse I had for making this film was purely personal. I wanted to understand who my grandpa was and if it was really true that he helped this dictator stay in power. What gave me the push to really go out there with my camera and try to understand what happened was the 2020 annulment of the elections in the Dominican Republic.”
History has a way of repeating itself. In the eight years she worked on the film, Tavares-Abel kept an objective eye on the political climate while she worked to bring her family’s hushed experiences to the surface, maneuvering through waves of her own emotion to reach a delicate, poignant feature that plumbs generational wounds.
“It really helped me understand family dynamics on a deeper level. I think all families have this, and that’s something that we wanted to portray in the film. We all have a grandfather, a great uncle, who maybe went to war and came back with all sorts of trauma associated with that experience. It doesn’t just stay with them; it’s inherited. It goes into play in the daily dynamics of each family,” she explained.
A TAVAB Production, produced by Lei González, founder at Santo-Domingo based Media Jibara in tandem with Santo-Domingo and Detroit-based Cinema Costanera, the film pairs live interviews and archive footage with a tender and deeply personal underlying arc, González admitting that she was attracted to the project for, “its fearless honesty, how it weaves personal and national history exploring the unseen situations that shape a country,” adding, “it’s a reflection on the complexities of truth, memory and the struggle to understand where we come from, something that resonates far beyond the Dominican Republic.”
The documentary, visionary in scope, sets a patient tone thanks to the film’s dedicated, female-fronted team, which Tavares-Abel credits for the engaging final cut.
From production designer Milena Volonteri, a textile artist who created the vast collage and helped the director whittle 60 years of Dominican history and 100 hours of footage into the coherent and gripping narrative, to cinematographer Kat Díaz who filmed with Tavares-Abel at the height of the pandemic, wading through throngs of demonstrators to get key footage-often facing aggressive adversaries and editor Nathalia Lafuente, also a key figure in the process, acting as confidante aside her role piecing together the edits.
“Women are taking up space, not being silenced anymore. It’s great, especially in filmmaking. Every year, I see new faces of female filmmakers that are really breaking boundaries and showing the kinder side of humanity,” the director stated. “I had a great team, and I think it helps that our team was mostly female.”
Throughout the film, the director is a gentle observer, coaxing stories from her loved ones. In many instances, the trepidation in their eyes says more than words could muster. The emotional toll of rehashing the past is honored, as the film sequences stack tragedies alongside a surge of cautious hope.
“When I first started writing this, it was going to be a purely historical film. It was going to be mostly based on archives,” Tavares-Abel relayed. “Then, on election day in 2020, my videographer and I went out with the camera with the idea, ‘let’s get some shots just so we can have a comparison,’ something to compare with the footage we have from 1990,” she continued.
“All of a sudden, the elections were canceled because of technological sabotage. We were shocked, and at the same time, it made us understand how important it was for us to make this film. The truth is that democracy is a work in progress everywhere in the world. Sometimes, we associate abuse of power or dictatorship with the global south, but it’s something that can happen even in North America and Europe. So, although this movie brings up a lot of emotions that we can associate with pain, seeing the way my generation got together, organized as poll watchers, is something that brings me a lot of joy.”
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