Poverty is older than richness

• Emir Kusturica : Diego Maradona is the man who felt in his skin all the humiliation of the world in 1985, at the historical dribble during the match between Argentina and England. Seven players stayed behind him in that moment, and those players took place for all the humiliated people during years and years, and who were waiting for revenge. For me, Maradona, in those few minutes, dribbled Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan, Great Brittain, the Queen Mother, Prince Charles, Pope John Paul 2, and - since football is a game of imagination - George Bush father and son ! For Maradona that was enough. After Paul Breitner, there was no more football players on the side of the poors. The Germany representative player was called an „engaged footballer“ during the romantic times of 70s. Maybe some people think that football players are stupid, indeed almost everyone does. But, I will not agree, because how can they make millions on their banck accounts if they were not smart. Yes, they are uneducated, of course ! We are in train to Mar del Plata at a demonstration against Bush, and Maradona is in that train. I discovered that Paul Breitner is not lonely, and the 70s are not lost for ever. In this train there is no places for stupidity. The situation is totaly opposite.
• Diego Maradona : You know, I learned to play football in the dark. Behind my house, there was the stadium of the team of the fourth league. I played the ball all day, and when the other children went homes I stayed in dark for two hours. I did not seen anything in that darkness ! I shot toward the goal, and I oriented just on two big sticks, searching for the net. Ten years after, when I signed my first contract for „Argentino Juniors“ I understod that the balls in the dark were very precise!
• EK : You were born in Favel Fiorito, the most poor part of Buenos Aires. I must ask you what was in your mind, becuse you never forgot that people, and you stayed with them forever...
• DM : Poor people will never betray you... Most of my friends, and one of them is Coppola my manager, robbed me and took money from me. But, my homeland friends from Fiorito stayed the same. This is the real place of poverty. Today there is maybe more asphalt,but poverty is the same as when I lived there. Politicians and those close to government became richer and richer. I also had a chance to become one of them, but I refused, and said NO. Reason is because I should steal from the poors. Just one time in my life I spoke with people involved in poltic life of Argentina, and I told everything they didn't want to hear.
• EK : Bono Vox and Bob Geldof are not as famous as you, but they are using very well their popularity for humanitarian actions and their promotion. You never did something like that.
• DM : Money takes yours time, and nothing else ! You must save just a litle dignity, pride and your health. So, 44 years are behind me, and I'm aware of the fact that poverty is in progress. I look in between those who have everything, and the others without anything. It is not just a problem of Argentina, Venezuela, Brasil, or Cuba... Americans smashed our heads. Look what they did to us in the 70s. They made us babys as they wanted, I speak of course metaphoricly... They put a military regime in Argentina, 30.000 people killed, then in Chile, Nicaragua, Guatemala. First they beat you, and then they leave you suffering. They come back with credits and a lot of money, and you are like a dog and live like a dog. But that doesn't work like this anymore, and they don't have the right for that kind of politic. After the military interventions and the suport of fascist regimes in Latin America we are finnally unified. Argentina, Brasil, Venezuela, we are again together to say loud and clear in their face what we think of that killer of Bush. But Emir I don't know why I tell all this to you, when you understeand all that, you are with us, aren't you? What are your feelings ?
• EK : I'm like Charlie Chaplin when he was walking in the street and someone gives him a flag ! Let's speak about the relations inside America. If I understeand clearly, they just smashed your brains, like they did with the OIL Agreement. The gave money to Mexico, and made 30.000 employees. Some Mexican had nice pays, but the money went in another country, not in Mexico...
• DM : Yes, that is correct ! Mexico is also really poor, except those 30.000 employees. American politicians did that all around the world, and that is always the same story. They take benefits ,and leave you just pieces...
• EK : So, what we can do about that. It is the same situation since the Pharaos and the Roman Empire ?
• DM : What to do ? It is hard to change the things, but the important thing is that we can speak about that ! Unfortunatly, the Pope doesn't want to speak about the problem, even if he should do... He has on his mind just one thing : how to keep the Vatican, just like the Americans. The Vatican is a very rich and powerful empire. John Paul 2 never was in Africa, and he never went there to kiss the ground and feed hungry children, aslo he never was in Argentina. But he took 150 million dollars for a comercial for condoms. An agency gave that money for a advertising campaign, but the Pope didn't have fate in condoms ! So he took the money and, of course nobody speaks about that. That is in the Vatican documentations, and noone mentioned how the Pope abandoned Africa. That is impossible... Number of poor people increased 9 times since the Berlin wall is down.
• EK : We are approaching Mar del Plata, and protesters are sleeping, in the air you can notice a forgoten solidarity. Just like the characters in the films of 70s, when they chose their destiny. I believe that every word of Maradona is expresing care and understanding of todays world. Once upone a time, he was like God, like the myth of Gilgamesh. An epic story about destroying a God made of mud. Since the time when he was the one and only magician of the game, to the moment he was without air. Stucked in a place where he couldn't breathe, he didn't have where to go. He was more popular than the Pope. On the top, so high, he didn't have enough air. And nobody had told him that such a highness was not safe for him ! He started to take cocain, as in Gilgamesh the „God of mud“ was hit on the ground. He started to search himself, like the guy which apears in the comercial for spaghetti, the fat Gauchos. Even in that moments he tried to come back into space with air enough for him. He wanted to be „normal“ and that brought him to a clinicly dead man state for four minutes. But the dream is back ! And I, I'm a witness siting in a chair next to him. I'm very lucky because I'm also part of his recovery. All have abandoned him, except his family and Fidel Castro. When the hospital of Buenos Aires closed his doors to him, Fidel hugged him. People can think that he could have never lived without drugs, because he couldn't support the burden of glory. But that's not just for that ! From his biography you can notice that he could not take care of himself, and in one moment he didn't know how to handle himself. When he became a profesional, River Plata offered him a lot of money, but he refused and went to Boca Juniors, when some supporters try to blackmail him, he fights with them, when his choach lied to him, he ruined the dressing room at the stadium. He never believed for real that money is just a waste of time...
• DM : I remember my father, when he was back from work, he didn't earn enough for 8 of us children. We waited him in silence, because there was no food. That, people can't understand, especialy those who were never hungry. My sister had to eat less so she could save dinner for me. In that kind of situation you develop simphaty, love and care, and those stories from my childhood wan't disappear just like that. My mother faked stomac sicknesses to save food for her kids, and she alwasy looked in the pots to verify again and again if there is no food for all. My brother, that is poverty, yes it is...Your mother lies to feed you. Someone can says this is science-fiction, but Emir, my brother that is the real life, and I tell you the truth.
• EK : Yes, this is poverty, and it's very sad. Some poeple forget very soon about that, and you how do you keep that feeling from your childhood ?
• DM : I did not forget ! I can't forget ! Poverty is older than richness ! My father worked on Kvantaca market places and always took heavy bags, even when he was old. When he got home my mother put him ice on his neck and on his back, to heal his pain. And we kids always were around him, that was like some kind of ritual that cannot vanish from my memories....
• EK : Let's talk about aristocratia among poor people. What is the strongest memory from the time of your childhood?
• DM : Dignity ! We never made birthdays parties, we never had money for that. Friends, family and cousins would give you a kiss on your birthday, and that kiss was the biggest present. I can speak a lot about bourgeoisie and poverty. I never made difference, but it is not the case of the other who became rich. I have no doubts. People made compromise to be near politicians ,and politicians used them when they needed their services. If you don't fit into that kind of profile, then you are mad. And yes, I'm mad, and I rather be mad then take what they served me. You know, Emir, I was a dead man for four minutes, and now I know what life is....
• EK : Since Ethiopia and „Live aid“ Bob Geldof is richer than before. Bono travels all over the world and asks the presidents to convince them to clean the debts of the poor African countries. He even lunched with Bush.
• DM : I know one thing that I will never have enough courage to lunch with Bush...
• EK : Why?
• DM : I will not feel nice eating with a mass-murderer.
• EK : Marquez told me a thing, that we can say many things about Fidel, but he was the guardian of hispano culture heritage in Latin America.
• DM : Yes, that is true, but Argentina is becoming now part of the USA. Argentinians sold to the Yankies all what they got, like the Southern part of Argentina, a clean and fertile territory. So, all what Fidel fought for, we lost ! With this money we just became one of the colonial parts of America, and they develop and spread all over world...
• EK : How did you meet Fidel Castro?
• DM : In 1987, I recieved 2 awards. One in Cuba, another in America. I said to the Americans „Keep that award“, and I went to Cuba. I met Fidel, and we spoke five hours about Che Guvera, Argentina. Of course, I read as a young man about the revolution, brave Che, Fidel...I felt in love with Fidel ! In my perception, he is like a lion fighting for his territory. He is the only politician, if we can call him like that, who isn't focussed on stealing from the poors. That's what Americans try to do....

Traduction : Nina Novaković and Matthieu Dhennin

The director of "Underground" shoots a documentary on the mythical Argentin football player and also prepares himself to support Serbia-Montenegro in Germany. His visions of the game, between politics and esthetics.
Met in Munich in April, Emir Kusturica and his No Smoking Orchestra were doing a concert in the Muffathalle. The day before had been announced the selection of Jens Lehmann as goal keeper of the German team, in place of the Bavarian giant Oliver Kahn. On stage, the singer of the itinerant Serbian band, "Dr. Nelle", who was carrying the shirt of ex-Yugoslavia, red star on the heart, did not miss the occasion to speak of it with the public : "If Kahn doesn't want to play for you, he can come in the team of Serbia-Montenegro!" The blank which followed in the public, made up essentially of alternative young people to whom football passes far above the head, brought back the band to its music. After the show, in the hot atmosphere and the over-populated backstage, discussion with the director - and approximate guitarist - who hasn't finished finishing with Maradona, the center of his next film. Not to say, its subject. At first, it looks like a testamentary ordering of the "Pibe de Oro". Then it appears to be, with Emir Kusturica, more conceptual and politically prospective.

• I've heard you were quite good in football...
  • Emir Kusturica : I was, like many children of my neighborhood. I was supposed to be among the best during our improvised matches in the streets. Think, if you were not able to play football with the neighbors, you would never have been respected. Unfortunately, later, I had an accident and lots of problems with my legs. I could almost play as a professional, but I was very often wounded and couldn't continue. I played in a team of young people in Sarajevo, but it was very complicated to manage with school. My father wanted that I continue my studies. Moreover, I didn't only play football, I also practised many other sports. And there either, I wasn't bad, but never an ace. I was never good enough, in a way. That could be a "natural" definition to answer the question: what is a good footballer? Well, one needs good legs and look like Maradona in order to be, eventually, the best. The idea, for me, was thus: do I continue like that, on this level? Well, I stopped. Even if I still play today for pleasure.
  
  
• As a child, did you have idoles ?
  • EK : Many. I don't know if you remember Dragan Djazic, of the Red Star of Belgrade? There was a generation of players, at that time! Sarajevo had won the championship of Yugoslavia. They had played against Olympiakos in UEFA (1), I were at the stadium, they had won 3-1, this is the best souvenir of my life, I think. I couldn't sleep of the night. Certainly because, often, people, like me at that time, dreamed to become footballers like them. Today, they are jealoused; before, they were envied. Contrary to many people, I always thought that good footballers were not stupid. In order to play well, you need an excellent notion of space and time, which are, according to me, the two essential references in a human life to be respected. Of course, you also need a certain education. But anyway, for me, a good footballer is like a big architect. The good footballer builds the structure of the game, draws it. The best players in the world are of that kind and, among them, Maradona is the one who reaches the most the architect. Wait... Ah! Giulietta! (he signs an autograph.) Maradona had a great freedom. He didn't let himself poisoned by the tactics and the strategies. When you think at his time you always see it as a finished era. It was a game much more based on the feelings. Today, we see running pitbulls on a field which became too small for their powerful engine. But this is true also for basketball and all the sports, though. They take weight, muscle, become "explosive". In the Maradona years, they ran approximately half less quickly. But especially, the foot remained a true game. Consider the goal he scored alone against England in Mexico (2), well, it marks the end of individualism in this sport. Maradona could satisfy himself to touch the ball only 2 minutes per match. Today, all the teams try to "preserve" the ball, that is the great change. (Big noise of machines which fall behind, laughters.)
  
  
• The «big change» ?
  • EK : Like for the cinema, we shouldn't be too much romantic, and pretend that football is not as good as it was. It is just different. Look at Ronaldinho, he is the perfect conjugation between the individual technique and speed. He just has his muscles, a little special, which seem made to wrap the ball as did Maradona. But he will never have the influence Maradona had on a match. It's like what are called the "big events" in History. The best matches of Maradona are part of the History, they are historical dates, because in these matches passed some messages, in each of his actions too, like "the hand of God". It's also for that reason he's still THE best.
  
  
• The film you are finishing on Maradona, was it his idea, yours, or did you decide together ?
  • EK : He called me once, twice, then we met. I was very happy to approach it. Not because of his notoriety but because he's someone as imperceptible in his life as he was on a field. He proved me that what I thougth was true: football is architecture. There are invisible lines, waves, which interact during 90 minutes. (He recognizes a pretty girl, and makes her pass elegantly in the tiny room where people eat, film, drink.)
  
  
• A defender of Naples said, one day, that when Maradona had the ball the defenders stopped playing to look at him. Were you in this situation with him?
  • EK : I see what you mean. During the shooting, we made some retakes of goals on a football field in Belgrade. Afterwards, he came to see me and said : "You see, I never kick hard on the ball." Indeed he touched the ball very gently. Then, I said to myself: "Yes, which footballer today would have this ball touch apparently so soft and yet so precise ?" The key, and there it is, deals with physics, geometry. And that is what raises the level of a player, of a football match. It is not just the combination of instinct and force they have today.
  
  
• For this film, did you follow him, did you direct him, or were you more a game partner ?
  • EK : We built some goals together. (he smiles.) In fact, I wanted to mark with him the end of our footballistic time. I started from this famous match against England in 1986, where he goes up all the field, passes seven English players and scores. I was astonished. I considered this action as a film. For me, it was like studying the Renaissance style for an architect. How somebody, at this moment, in this place, could pass all these guys? He was coming back from the front, he gets the ball as a pivot, passes the first in his camp, then turns around the second - it's like if it had been written for a cartoon. No, rather for the cinema. It's this kind of trick which makes football incredible. The great players make the great events, it's not fiction and yet it remains completely unreal. Because the ball, the most perfect geometrical form, fly like never anybody could imagine it. Each match is just a shadow compared to this Argentina-England which is splendid.
  
  
• Is your film a documentary ?
  • EK : Yes, with seven chapiters and seven characters. Because I am persuaded that when Maradona was passing these seven players he was in fact passing the Queen mother, Margaret Thatcher, Prince Charles, George Bush, any other people of that kind I must still find out. I will add incrustations, to match to his life the seven personalities he passed for this historical goal.
  
  
• What is the goal Maradona is aiming at, by making this film with you ?
  • EK : The goal is political. He is a catholic but he hates the popes. He spoke to me a lot about John Paul II, responsible of hundreds of thousands of died in Africa because he didn't want that people use condoms. But it's also the story of Latin America, from which he's the product. The story of the military dictatorship imposed by Henry Kissinger and others, which makes today that the major part of these South Americans think the opposite of what North Americans wanted to inculcate to them at first. Today, there is no more left or right, there is the result of a historical process: altermondialism. This idea of Karl Marx that all the History would go towards State capitalism, gives today that we live in the corporative world. That some companies want to bring populations to the ultimate expression of democracy doesn't have any sense. Soon, perhaps five or six companies will have all the powers. And Latin America is the example of the failure of the totalitarian, authoritative systems. Maradona is the symbolic and charismatic figure of all this, and it's why I believe in this film. I also followed him in Mar del Plata during the anti-Bush demonstrations. I saw the passion of football which animated these people and clearly noted that this country (Argentina, note) is now ruled by a peronist (3): they lost this idea of left and right. We can still be French or Italian, but, you speak seriously about politics, right and left do not exist any more. Maradona represents what, in life and in football, is essential. Look at the Real Madrid with its million dollars, it's the Pepsi-Cola of football.
  
  
• Is Maradona aware of his power ?
  • EK : Absolutely. He enjoys it. I could detail several aspects of his personality. From the politician to the samba dancer. In short, I would say: excited, small, big and fine psychologist. An incredible and beautiful ergonomy, a character of carnival, made for the parties.
  
  
• Some oppressive regimes, like Argentina for Maradona or, in a way, Great Britain for a Northern Irishman like George Best, have created the greatest footballers. Do you think it is because of this pressure on the players ?
  • EK : George Best, the guy of Liverpool ? (4) Perhaps, but it's still the past! Today, it's important to understand that football is an industrial game. And it goes more and more in this direction. So, who are the people who try to break this logic? Some people who, like those in basketball were coming from Harlem, are in the margin, were oppressed, knew poverty and which behave finally a little like the hockeyplayers of ex-USSR, sell themselves elsewhere. They are the only people left.
  
  
• Would have Maradona agree to play for Berlusconi or Abramovich ?
  • EK : You know, he's a contradictory character. He can do all what you don't expect. Yes, he would have played for Abramovich (Russian billionaire, president of the Chelsea football club, note). I remember he told me that Berlusconi, at the time, offered him millions when he was in Barcelona. But Maradona hates the authority. And he hated the president of Barcelona, Josep Lluis Nunez, and said to me that he was like João Havelange... Maradona could have played in the Milan AC, but Berlusconi said that the players that were good jugglers generally scored few goals. And in fact, indeed, those who are able to make miracles with a ball are jugglers, but are never the best players. Without this remark of Berlusconi, Maradona could have played in Milan. However, after this declaration, Maradona said to him fuck off and that he would never want to see him again. (Behind, some musicians make a terrible noise, we don't known if they shout or if they laugh.)
  
  
• And for this World cup, how is Serbia-Montenegro ?
  • EK : It should go quite far. It's the first time that there was a coherent work with this team, which corresponds to our culture and at the same time to a collective effectiveness. We always had big individualities, and that in all the sports, but today there is no peace judge in this team, no Pancev, no Mijatovic. There is a team, from n°1 to n° 11.
  
  
• Did you see them playing ?
  • EK : Yes. Do you remember Croatia in 1998 ? I think they were collectively bounded, by patriotism. We could feel it. I believe in patriotism in those circumstances. Suker is the only player I remember. So, here it is.
  
  
• Does Serbia-Montenegro 2006 look like Croatia 1998 ?
  • EK : Maybe they won't go as far as them, but it will be close.

(1) First round 1967.
(2) Quarter of finale of the World Cup in Mexico. The match was lived as a revenge after the Maluin war, in 1982.
(3) Nestor Kirchner.
(4) Emir Kusturica doesn't like English football and you feel it. George Best, Northern Irishman, played in Manchester United.

Interview made by Olivier Villepreux (in Munich)