Nora Cortiñas’ life changed forever on April 15, 1977, the day her 24-year-old son, Gustavo Cortiñas, disappeared in Castelar, Buenos Aires Province, at the hands of Argentina’s military junta.
A month later, Nora joined the Madres de Plaza de Mayo at their weekly march in Buenos Aires. From that day on, every Thursday for four decades, she marched for memory, truth, justice – and her missing son.
Five months on from her death at the age of 94, the iconic human rights leader is being brought to the big screen. Set for general release on November 7, 2024, director Jayson McNamara’s second feature, Norita, is a behind-the-scenes look at a life of activism.
In an interview, McNamara spoke of the joys of working with Nora, her “cinematic” nature and how he won her trust through handwritten notes and participating in the Madres’ weekly marches at the Plaza de Mayo.
Detailing how he and co-director Andrea Tortonese created their new documentary, he highlights the support of executive producers like Jane Fonda, Bárbara Muschietti and musician Gustavo Santaolalla in helping the film reach a wider global audience.
Congratulations on your film. I understand the première was in Hollywood and last weekend, it was screened here in Buenos Aires. How did it go?
It premiered at the Dances with Films Festival in June in Los Angeles and we’ve had three festival screenings in different parts of Argentina. On November 7, it’s going to be released in theatres in Argentina.
How has the response been?
You know, it’s a very emotional documentary, it’s not like the kind of historical political film where you get a message beaten down your throat, that type of thing. It’s like a homage to an amazing woman who’s led an amazing life, and so it’s interesting people are fairly quiet after the film plays.
I think my assumptions and my experience talking to people is that they are usually very moved by the story and need a bit of time to take it in. And in Argentina especially, people are very respectful of Nora as a historical figure and a political leader.
What inspired you to focus on Nora and her story, and the story of the Madres de Plaza de Mayo?
In my first film [Messenger on a White Horse], I interviewed a group of them because it was also set in the [1976-1983 military] dictatorship, and profiled the story of the Buenos Aires Herald. I met Nora when I was doing my first film and then subsequently I took an interest in her specifically because among the mothers, she was one of the only “fully active” activists.
She was out and about on the street most days, going to protests and going to panel discussions. A very very busy woman. I just thought she was charming. There was something cinematic about Nora, she just seemed made for a movie in the way.
She was very charismatic as a woman – very cheeky, very funny – and could also be quite stern. Very emotional as well. She allows herself to be seen, very vulnerable. I just observed her over several years and I petitioned her to make the film.
She took a lot of convincing because making a documentary about your own life implies having to engage with filmmakers regularly, and she didn’t necessarily have time for that. Eventually, she and I were able to agree about how the film would look, and what story it would tell. And once we had gone through the motions of coming to a consensus, she was more available.
Given the political situation in Argentina right now, which she was very vocal against, what do you feel is the importance and relevance of sharing her story now?
I think that in Argentina, whenever there is a big political shift or shift in the system, there is always the tendency to play with the issue of the dictatorship, and try and use it to divide the waters of Argentine society. Because it’s so close to so many people, and it’s a national shame as well. It’s the real sore point of Argentine history, and so people tend to have really strong reactions to it.
I think at the moment the film is relevant in the sense that it is not about the politicians of today, it’s not about the way the government uses dictatorship as a tool to divide people. It’s sort of a historical document that shows things for what they were and how they happened and explains the effect of the dictatorship on an individual woman and her family. It goes back to the basics of the story of Nora and her family and the Madres de Plaza de Mayo – Línea Fundadora.
A lot of people close to Nora and a lot of people in the activist community see how there are comments that deny or minimise the crimes of the dictatorship, and it’s incredibly upsetting and disheartening for those people. Especially for the ones who have missing relatives that were jailed and tortured. There is no love lost, especially with this government.
What was the process of working with Nora… did she have anything that was ‘non-negotiable’ before agreeing to be involved?
That’s a really interesting question. The backstory of how we got the film started is really funny. Like I said she was really busy and kind of trying to wiggle her way out of the idea and, you know, I just insisted. One thing I noticed in the process of trying to convince her to do the project was that I needed to show my face every Thursday in the Plaza and allow her to get to know me as well on a different level, so that she could trust me with her story.
Kind of at the beginning, I was like ‘Oh this is a great idea of course she’s going to say yes.’ But the closer you get to someone the more you realise ‘Oh this is a big thing I’m asking them to do, and they don’t know me.’
I went to the Plaza de Mayo pretty much every Thursday for three years and then, of course, when we were filming. And then what I would do is every time I would try to talk to her and she would be distracted or busy so I started writing ideas on paper and I would give them to her, for example, at a protest or a panel discussion or whatever. And she would read the idea on the train on the way home, out towards the West of Buenos Aires. And the next morning she would call me and we would talk about it.
We had this running joke for a while that I was trying to court Nora, and there were love letters and we would start going to have lunch together and we would call them dates! It was really fun and really great to get to know each other.
I have a husband and that also I think made her relaxed, she allowed herself to play a little more because I am gay. In terms of what was off-limits, you know we assumed at the beginning that she wouldn’t want to talk a lot about her relationship with her surviving son, Marcello, who is three years younger than Gustavo. But when Nora started bringing it up, that’s when we realised it wasn’t off-topic and we could actually speak about it.
There is a combination of animation and real-life footage. What inspired you to introduce that and how did you go about kind of incorporating that into the film?
That’s an interesting story because it kind of gives rise to the collaboration between myself and my co-director, Andrea Tortonese. So she and I worked on the animation for several years as we were filming and started editing.
The animation served and was useful in illustrating and showing what you can’t show in a dictatorship. The unexplainable. It’s this ancient power that animation has, and people associate it with our dream life and childhood self. And in the context of a film that’s about some really hard stories and hard issues and hard experiences, devastating experiences, we thought that it made everything a little bit easier to stomach and digest.
At the same time the way that it’s been done, there’s a sort of magical realism to it that’s quite soft and gentle. It’s a very interesting combination of effects that the animation has given us in the film. It’s just so powerful and it’s prominent, even though it’s sort of scattered around the film.
There are a few big names attached to the project including the likes of Jane Fonda, and Gustavo Santolalla. What was the process of recruiting people like this, to be a part of the film?
In every scenario and every person we brought on had a different journey to get to them. I spent several years trying to finance the post-production of the film. Because of the animation and the archives, all the costs associated with post-producing, editing, sound, etc. were kind of the biggest expense, so I spent several years trying to find support.
In that process, I thought well the best way to bring more visibility into the project would be to try and attach like-minded people to it that were in a position to connect me to different people and financing sources and stuff like that. I was able to contact Jane Fonda through Avi Lewis, who is a Canadian filmmaker and activist. She was very responsive to supporting the project and putting her name on it as a way of precisely that, giving it more visibility. And then Gustavo was an interesting experience because Nora had suggested that Gustavo would maybe want to write a bit of music for the film. And so we contacted him and he’s been so generous in so many ways. Not only did he work with young and upcoming composers, he brought them to his team, directed the final score, and composed the whole score of the film. And then he’s also been a real champion in terms of giving it to the right people and promoting it. He’s been a huge friend and champion of the project, and that came about from Nora’s relationship with him and his connection to the mothers.
I’d also like to mention Bárbara Muschietti, an Argentine producer in LA, and I also approached her not expecting much, but because it’s a story that’s so close to heart for any Argentine, she has also come onboard as an executive producer
I’ve been very lucky in that regard and could not have done it without them. I think the film otherwise would have been a very nice independent documentary but maybe wouldn’t have had such a good chance of getting an audience. And as a filmmaker, that is a huge honour to be able to show your film widely.
What were a few of the biggest challenges you faced while directing this film? Is there anything you would have done differently?
I think that broadly speaking, making independent documentary cinema nowadays has become incredibly difficult because there is a lot of uncertainty. Through COVID there was a lot of uncertainty about where financing was coming from, there’s been a boom-bust cycle several times even in the space of my making this project.
Financing is always the biggest problem, and the cards are stacked against any director who doesn’t have two or three films under their belt. You are going out and asking for a lot of money to produce a really expensive type of cultural product. You need to have proven yourself already and can handle other people's money. And I think that’s challenging, and that it’s hard to say in hindsight.
I think also one of the other things too is that sometimes when you are making a film about someone who is so widely loved and respected, you have this tendency to make the film for everyone. In my experience, there were several instances where I shared a rough cut to get opinions, and it kind of spins you out and throws you off-centre. Because it is your vision and your idea, and you can’t make a film that everyone loves. And you can’t make a perfect film. That was a lesson learned as well. With Nora I wanted the film to tick the boxes in every way and for every kind of viewer. And I realised over time that that's not possible.
What were some favourite memories you have with Nora?
When I met Nora, she was going to small marches and doing grassroots activism. With organisations who were fighting for slight governmental attention. What happened when we started filming her in 2018, coincided with her involvement within the feminist movements. We were able to accompany Nora as she was starting to speak at these massive rallies in support of abortion reform. To be able to see Nora in two turns, from that grassroots activist to a massive revolutionary icon – a little old lady on stage put in the centre of this movement as a figurehead and voice. We were able to experience that, and there is a real beauty in knowing that her son was a revolutionary and wanted major social change, and Nora 40 to 50 years later has become what she envisioned her son's life would be. It came full circle and that was the most rewarding and surprising thing. As a man, being able to accompany that and learn about patriarchy, be surrounded by Nora and these amazing women activists, and go on my journey is something that I am grateful for. And maybe it wouldn't have happened without the project.
Just being able to share the experience with Nora, finding the opportunity to tell the story of her family responsibly, and collaborating with the family. That was probably the most rewarding thing to create a film to heal some women if that’s at all possible. And to give a little bit of a voice to the fathers of the disappeared, putting a focus on the family and apex of the family life.
Do you have any idea of what you want to cover or highlight next?
I have a few projects but what I can say is that I’m focused on and motivated by people who confront injustices. Everyone thinks they’re an activist because they post on Instagram, which is fine, but it’s not activism. People are putting their lives, bodies, and families on the line. I find those people are really interesting and complex. Focusing on people who confront injustices would be the way to describe it.
