Latin American Short Stories

14 responses so far ↓

•   jimminkc // Oct 2nd 2014 at 4:27 am

  In the short story and the movie “Blow Up” there was many similarities and differences. The plots of the stories were similar but they each had their own character. At the beginning of the movie we saw a lot of different characters. While watching I felt like we got to see a lot of the photographer’s life style. In the story, it was a little confusing because at the beginning it was unclear of whether or not he was dead or alive. Both the movie and story had the picture scene which included a man and a women. In the story, I concluded that the man was a pimp and the woman was his mistress. I was taken by surprise in the movie when the photos taken were apart of a possible murder case. The man in the picture was murdered. Both the movie and the story had a lot of scenes where it left me wondering. In the story I stopped multiple times wondering who the two people in the picture were. In the story I knew who the people were but I was confused with their relationship and also how and why the man was murdered.

•   jimminkc // Oct 2nd 2014 at 4:30 am

  In the short story and the movie “Blow Up” there was many similarities and differences. The plots of the stories were similar but they each had their own character. At the beginning of the movie we saw a lot of different characters. While watching I felt like we got to see a lot of the photographer’s life style. In the story, it was a little confusing because at the beginning it was unclear of whether or not he was dead or alive. Both the movie and story had the picture scene which included a man and a women. In the story, I concluded that the man was a pimp and the woman was his mistress. I was taken by surprise in the movie when the photos taken were apart of a possible murder case. The man in the picture was murdered. Both the movie and the story had a lot of scenes where it left me wondering. In the story I stopped multiple times wondering who the two people in the picture were. In the story I knew who the people were but I was confused with their relationship and also how and why the man was murdered. After reading the story and watching the movie I see a connection with man murdered in the movie and the speaker at the beginning of the story, it says, ” and I’m alive, I’m not trying to fool anybody”. This makes me wonder if the murdered man in the movie is symbolized through the speaker of the story.

•   Madeleine // Oct 2nd 2014 at 4:04 pm

  Although the plot subtleties and details of Julio Cortázar’s short story “Blowup” and the movie “Blowup,” directed by Michelangelo Antonioni, are quite different, the underlying message is the same. At the conclusion, the main character finds himself helpless to rescuing those around him.

  In the short story, the narrator is a french-spanish translator and an amateur photographer. The story takes place in France, and the narrator takes photographs in his spare time, as a hobby. He is visually stimulated by nature, and frequently throughout the story he mentions the clouds he sees drifting by. He comments, “there goes another, with a grey edge” (Cortázar 115) and “now a large cloud is going by, almost black” (Cortázar 118). While sitting in town one day and observing the river, he sees a blond woman seducing a teenage boy and decides to capture the moment on film. The woman sees him and demands the film so that there is no evidence of her advances, and the boy takes the opportunity to escape. Then, an older man approaches from his car. He had been observing the same scene, and the narrator realizes that the woman must work for him, to trick children and lead them right to the boss, into child slavery, prostitution, etc. The narrator refuses to hand over the photos, and instead hurries away and develops the prints in his studio.

  Contrary to the story, in the movie “Blowup,” the narrator is a professional photographer who is visually stimulated by women, who both dresses and photographs girls for modeling and fashion purposes, and for his own enjoyment. The movie takes place in London, England, and while in the park one day, he start photographing two lovers-not a woman seducing a boy, but a woman and a middle aged man. Similar to the short story, the woman runs up to the narrator and demands the film. The narrator refuses to give it to her, and blows up the pictures in his studio. But later, the photographer notices something strange in the pictures. He sees a man with a gun hiding in the bushes. He returns to the park to find the body of the middle-aged man, shot and killed.

  The circumstances are different in these two works: one male is a young boy and one is an adult, one gets away and one is killed. At the end of the movie, the photographer realized that while he saw the murder scene and even photographed it, he was not capable of helping the victim. It appears that he was able to help the male character in the story, but in the closing pages he reflects that even if he stopped that one case, other children were being seduced and he could do nothing about it. He says that the boss and the woman were, “taking their revenge on me, demonstrating clearly what was going to happen” (Cortázar 129). At another time, “he was going to say yes, that the proposition carried money with it or a gimmick, and I couldn’t tell for him to run, or even open the road to him again with a new photo, a small and almost meek intervention” (Cortázar 130). This realization and acceptance of reality is like the man that is murdered in the movie. The narrator couldn’t save him, and neither can he save the majority of children.

•   jacobsoh // Oct 2nd 2014 at 11:33 pm

  The Julio Cortázar’s short story “Blowup” and the associated movie “Blowup,” directed by Michelangelo Antonioni are similar in the fact that there is a photographer capturing a scene. A closer look at the image reveals that there is more to it and it is not what is seems. The movie and the short story greatly differ, however, in describing the photographer as well as what happened in each scene of the photo.

  In the short story the narrator is a translator “and in his spare time an amateur photographer” (116). There is not much emphasis on the narrator’s life, so as a reader we do not have a very concrete idea of who he is. In the film much of the movie is spent portraying the narrator’s life. In the film he is a high fashion photographer. The film almost seems to portray him in a negative way as he bosses people around and negatively treats some women.

  The scene in the park, and the photo itself, is also very different between the short story and the film. In the story the narrator focuses on the boy, imaging what his life is like, and does not focus on the woman. In the film however it appears the boy is instead a man and the narrator is focused on the woman. Her role is much more prevalent in the film than in the story.

  The pictures and the conclusions the narrator makes also differ for the story and the film. In the story picture seems to reveal that the women was actually a prostitute and the mysterious man nearby was her pimp. In the film, however, the picture reveals a murder.

•   chicasi // Oct 3rd 2014 at 1:43 am

  The short story “Blow Up” by Julio Cortazar and the film “Blow-Up” by Michelangelo Antonioni are very different stories that associate a photographer capturing scenes on film. Both photographers are different with their approach to pictures, however. The story goes into a lot of detail regarding the scene the photographer, Roberto Michel, witnesses. The film has Thomas taking photos of fashion taking pictures of a couple for his own interests. Michel is depicted as an amateur photographer, while Thomas is viewed as a professional fashion photographer.

  The stories also have different scenes where the photographers interacted with. The short story depicts a scene Michel describes between a timid boy, a fierce blond woman, and a man in a grey hat. The woman was intimidating the boy, and because Michel decided to jump in by taking a picture, the boy was able to run away while the woman was demanding Michel’s film. The film has Thomas witnessing the body of the man from the couple he photographed earlier. Thomas couldn’t take a picture and when he goes back to his studio, he finds that his negatives and pictures were gone. By the time he goes back to the body, it was also gone. The differences have one photographer keeping his film while the other loses it, and one male surviving an ordeal, who was the boy, and the other killed off, who was the man in the film.

•   applegsa // Oct 3rd 2014 at 1:50 am

  “Blowup” by Julio Cortazar, and “Blowup” the movie, are obviously similar due to the fact that the movie was inspired by the story; however, they also have major differences. Both the movie and the story follow the life of a photographer, who catches something important on film. The movie takes this plot from the story and dramatizes what was caught on film more than it is in the story. Nonetheless, the movie and the story still share the same core idea which the plot revolves around. Also, both versions of “Blowup” were mysterious and confusing at times, which intrigued me when reading and watching them.

  At the same time, although the movie and the story both follow a certain photographer, these photographers are also a big difference between the two, because they are different characters. One obvious difference is their difference in age; one is a boy and one is a man. In the movie, the photographer is a distinct type of photographer: a fashion photographer, which is different than in the story. Additionally, the photographer in the movie seems to be developed more as a character than in the story, where it is more focused on what the photographer is capturing than the character himself.

•   danona // Oct 3rd 2014 at 2:07 am

  Julio Cortázar’s “Blow Up” and the film “Blow Up” were vastly different; it seemed as if they were two different stories all together. However, the portrayal of the main character remains somewhat constant throughout both.

  In the story “Blow Up,” the narrator is a French-Spanish translator who enjoys photography as a hobby, whereas in the film, the main character is a professional photographer in London. However both interpretations of this character have a deep respect for photography. In the movie, it is clear that Thomas cares about the outcome of his photos as he is constantly barking orders at his models and taking multiple pictures. In the story, his admiration is explored even further as he states that one has “a duty to be attentive” while walking around (117). The narrator even states that this hobby should be taught to kids “very early in life” (117). The narrator’s tone is also the same of that of Thomas’; in the movie, Thomas was always in charge and had the attitude of “I know best.” In the story, the narrator claims that there is more to photography than “snapping the stupid silhouette of the VIP leaving number 10 Downing Street” (117). Both representations of this character give off a cocky, arrogant personality.

  The plots in both stories are unalike in various ways. For example, in the film Thomas comes across a couple, but it is not a young boy as described in the story—rather, it is an older gentlemen. In the movie, the woman was more afraid of being caught but in the story, it seems that the boy is more afraid because he is described as “a young colt or hare” (118). In Cortázar’s “Blow Up,” the woman does not seem as frantic and caught up in getting the film back; in the movie, she makes multiple attempts to get the film, even going so far as to sleep with Thomas to get the pictures. The story also does not mention anything about a dead body in the park, which is vital to the plot of the movie.

•   Cailin // Oct 3rd 2014 at 2:38 am

  The short story “Blow Up” and its movie version center around a photographer, Michel, and a particular situation he finds himself in. In the movie, the scene most directly paralleled to the story takes place in a park, where he is captivated by a couple and decides to take their picture. Afterwards, the woman runs up and demands to have the photograph, calling it an invasion of privacy.
  While this scene in the movie was faithful to the story, the main character’s motives and personality were extremely different. In the story, he enjoys photography as a hobby, and uses it as a tool to live in the moment, recognize beauty in life, and see the importance and interest in small details around him. In the movie, however, he is driven by money and his personality is very authoritative, and he takes advantage of his superiority. The outcome is the same: the photographer realizes through his musings of what occurred in the park that the man the woman was seducing could have been in danger. However, in the story, the protagonist was shocked and even brought to tears, while the movie version showed him to be investigative, and not showing as much emotion. Though the literal construction of the plot in the movie was faithful to that in the text, the characterization of the main character gave very different tones to the two media: one, imaginative, creative, and haunting; the other, intrusive and uncomfortable.

•   Hannah // Oct 3rd 2014 at 2:53 am

  In Cortázar’s short story “Blow Up” and the associated film, directed by Michelangelo Antonioni,
  photography and lack of control play a central element in the life of the main character, yet the personal traits of the two and the major photographic subject of the two characters are vastly different.

  In the story “Blow Up” and the film, neither character has much control over what happens in his life, partly due to the nature of his interest in photography. For example, in the short story, the photographer tries to interfere in the encounter of a young boy and a seductive woman, succeeding in allowing the boy to run off (Cortázar 125). The photographer believes he aids a young boy in taking flight from a woman whom the boy met in a chance encounter. He believes he is aiding in the continuation of the boy’s innocence. However, he later realizes that “what [he] had imagined earlier was much less horrible than the reality” (129) and he “could do absolutely nothing.” (129) The photographer realizes that the encounter was not a chance encounter, really, but from what the reader can infer, a prostitution arrangement of the seductive woman. He can no longer aid anyone from his perspective as a man behind a camera, waiting for others to make an action. He is limited. Similarly, the photographer in the film Blow-up thinks he prevented a murder from taking place when he sees a gunman in the background of a photograph he took. He believes his taking the picture prevented the gunman from shooting the man he was going to kill. He later comes across the dead body, though, finding out that his photograph made no difference. The man still died. He still had to deal with the reality that as a photographer his actions make a small difference. He only observes the world around him instead of taking an active part in it.

  The speaker in the story “Blow Up” and the main character in the film have very different values and motivations and are focused on very different things for their photography. In the story “Blow Up,” the speaker fixates around the interaction between a young boy and a woman who appears to be seducing the boy. His actions convey his conviction that protecting innocence is important. He even comments that he can be a “puritan.” Contrastingly, the photographer in the film Blow-up concentrates on his discovery of a murderer and a murdered man. His views are far less innocent. In fact, the photographer in the film Blow-up has a constant slew of women, and it is not always clear whether or not the sexual relations are mutually agreed upon. He looks upon his life with a less innocent and well-meaning view, initially, though may be changed towards the end of the film, where he earnestly attempts yet fails to contact authorities to solve the mystery of the dead man.

•   medinaeg // Oct 3rd 2014 at 4:00 am

  In “Blow Up” by Cortazar and the film “Blow Up” both narrator and actor have a tendency to focus on photography and cannot keep focus on reality.

  In the film the actor believed he saved someone from dying by taking a picture. In the reading the narrator believed kids should be taught how to take photographs, as it “requires discipline.” Believing photographs are a big part of life, which have the power to save, and the need to be taught early. Though in the film the person who was believed to be “saved” died and only a photo of the gunman is the only help that can be given. The help of the photo can help determine who was the killer, not the photo of the man with a gun, since a photo only captures a moment in time. The narrator is determined to record what occurs and the method chosen is photographs. This idea carries on in the introduction of the text. How will a moment in time be recorded “the first person or in the second…the third person”? Both believing photographs are centers of interaction necessary for a purpose. Differences between the film and text are how they both think of clouds. In the film the actor realizes the clouds and how they affected his pictures. In the text the narrator focuses on clouds and then changes his idea to pigeons. “Clouds, and once in a while a pigeon.” Both narrator and actor have different ideas of how clouds affect their photographs.

•   Estiven // Oct 3rd 2014 at 4:18 am

  In the film “Blow Up” and the story “Blow Up” by Cortazar, Michel’s obsession differs that in the movie he is passionate about the art of taking pictures to the point that it becomes dangerous, while in the story Michel is obsessed with the safety of they young teenager who he thinks is being inappropriately groped. In the movie, takes pictures of his daily life and anything that he finds interesting. When arriving at the park he was looking for things to photograph but instead he got into an awkward interaction with two people who were kissing at the park. Michel invaded their privacy and took pictures of them while they were being intimate. Michel is shaped as a character that does what he says; he doesn’t hesitate to make his decisions and barely cares about other people’s opinions. He violated the private intimate interaction between women and the man by taking pictures of them and when the women protested he wouldn’t give her the pictures. In the movie he paid no attention to the male figure while in story he is obsessed with protecting the young boy. At one point he compares the young boy to somebody that is attempting to escape from an attack “ The important thing was having helped the kid to escape in time (this in case my theorizing was correct which was not sufficiently proven, but the running away itself seemed to show it so)(127)”. Michel seemed unusual because the young boy didn’t feel like the woman was attacking him, actually the young boy was fine until Mitchel started taking pictures and the boy felt scared and ran away. In both the story and the movie Michel is a photographer but the way he approaches what he takes pictures of and his personality is not the same.

•   Aden // Oct 3rd 2014 at 6:06 am

  The movie “Blow Up” and the story “Blow Up” by Julio Cortázar are similar fundamentally but are very different in plot. The story was a first and third person account with a plethora of detail and observation. The speaker analyzed every aspect of his encounter with the couple and put it in words. In the movie dialogue is starkly lacking and the viewer must figure out what Thomas the photographer is thinking. This strongly contrasts the movie and makes the viewer work much harder to discern Thomas’ mental state, while the story displays this plainly. In the plot of the movie the woman’s companion in the park in a man and in the story he is a boy. The plot further separates when there is no murder in the story and there is a murder in the movie. Thomas notices a “disquieting aura” about the situation with the couple in the park in the story and in the movie he also notices something is wrong. He is very perceptive to the body language and awkwardness in both. He reads the situation and asserts quickly what is happening in both. Thomas seems to believe that the photos he took in both the story and the movie brought finality to the situations. There was a dead man in the movie and Thomas simply left him there after confirming his suspicions. He states in the story that “the photo had been taken, the time had run out, gone” as if that were the end of it. He has a very selfish relationship with the events and is only interested in finding and confirming facts for himself. He is clearly suffering mentally in both story and movie during his analysis of the couple’s rendezvous and he makes strong assumptions in both. Thomas is only able to see the unfolding of the events and their significance because he is in a questionable mental state and so obsessive of a random encounter. His characterization and odd habits are paramount to both the movie and story.

•   grandam // Oct 3rd 2014 at 6:18 am

  While “Blow Up” the film and the movie tell the story of the same character, they differ greatly in most other aspects. The story is only a brief, zoomed-in snap shot of the film. Much like how the main character must zoom in on his picture to get more information about the murder, the audience also has the ability to focus in and capture only a small section of the film through the short story. The longer length allows the characters to become more developed in the movie and the formation of side-plots. Both portrayed the protagonist as a self-centered photographer, but the movie shows him from the outside while the story gives greater insight to his inner emotions and motivations. The story only hints at the greater complexity of the characters, unable to develop its characters.
  The relationship between the main character and his female neighbor is one such connection that remains undeveloped in the short story. His life seems to be devoid of true love interest except for his time with her. Later in the movie, however, he sees her with another man. This event, while it doesn’t seem to completely shock him, does leave him with art as the sole focus of his passion. He approaches his photography with an intensity that is shown far more clearly in the movie than the story because of the film’s ability to play characters off each other and compare them visually. The movie created a more complete story for the snap shot provided by the short story.

•   Kienan // Oct 3rd 2014 at 3:11 pm

  The movie Blow Up has many differences to Cortarzar’s story “Blow Up”. First, it is interesting how there can be so many changes from the story to the movie. For example, no one dies or is killed in the story, but the dead man is a highlighted point in the movie. Also, the way that the boy is described in the story is that he is about 15 years old, but in the movie he looks to be older. He may not be the same age as the woman in the movie, but he is not a child. In the movie there is no man sitting in a car watching Michel and the couple, but there is one in the story. Some similarities is how slow moving the movie and the story are without definitively explaining what is happening, so it keeps the reader and viewer at edge constantly waiting for something to blow up or something big to happen. Neither the movie nor story make much sense in the regards to a typical narrative, and that is because of the way it is written in such detail about the little things that are occurring. The movie and the way it is made in regards to the camera angles, the music, the dialogue between characters and the setting reminds me of Moonrise Kingdom, another movie that is an odd narrative about rebellion. Overall the movie and story do not have much in common, which makes it more interesting seeing where the movie directors came up with the concepts in the movie.

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