Tainted heroes

As more and more films come out based on the “true stories” of people, we encounter the disconnect between appearance and reality and search for a nugget of truth we can take away.

Feature films are not documentaries and take liberties with their subjects to tell a coherent story in a couple of hours of screen time. That’s no easy task.

Last fall came Captain Phillips, an excellent film with magnificent performances by veteran actor Tom Hanks and newcomer Barkhad Abdi, the latter receiving an Oscar nomination. The film made Phillips into a hero. But many of his own crew sued him because, they said, he needlessly endangered the crew and could have avoided the capture of the ship by pirates.

Now comes Cesar Chavez, based on the life and work of the well-known civil rights activist and labor organizer. The film is well-acted, with Michael Pena in the title role. It doesn’t portray Chavez as without flaws. A major part of the story is his estrangement from his oldest son, who feels his father cares more about the movement than about his family.

This is a common experience, one many children of church workers, for example, can attest to. And while there’s no denying that Chavez accomplished much to bring greater economic justice to farmworkers, his ideals sometimes got in the way of caring for his family.

There is much to like in the film and in the fact of its being released, though it’s not selling many tickets. It portrays the unjust conditions faced by farmworkers in California in the early 1960s, when Chavez and others began organizing them and challenging the growers to pay a living wage. Chavez promotes nonviolence, echoing tactics of Ghandi and King, as he confronts the violence of the growers and the local sheriff.

The film shows how helpful Robert Kennedy was to the movement at key moments and how Ronald Reagan, then governor of California, and President Nixon went out of their way to oppose the farmworkers’ strike against the growers. The importance of Chavez’ Catholic faith is evident, particularly when he goes on a 25-day fast, which he breaks with Kennedy while taking Communion.

The film is also important given today’s realities: many people without a living wage and unions struggling to survive. We need the inspiration of films like this to keep pursuing justice for poor people.

The film ends soon after the farmworkers and growers sign an agreement that ends the strike. In the years following, things got a bit stranger, and Chavez became even more autocratic and controlling.

A piece by Nathan Heller in the April 14 New Yorker discusses a new biography, The Crusades of Cesar Chavez by Miriam Pawel, which “reassesses Chavez’s legacy under a raking light,” writes Heller.

The article shows that while the film is relatively true to the period it covers, it doesn’t tell the whole story of the man. In fact, the film’s original title was Cesar Chavez: An American Hero. It dropped the last three words.

I won’t try to summarize the long article, but one sentence captures some of its point: “Chavez championed peaceful practices but had a warrior’s taste for incursion and righteous conflict.”

Is there a lesson? One might be to watch such movies with the understanding that they cannot tell the whole story. Another is to learn more of that story.

Cesar Chavez is worth seeing. He was an important figure and in many ways more of a hero than Captain Phillips.