World Leaders Are Cannibals: I Said I Would Never Talk About Politics
I Said I Would Never Talk About Politics (2015) is a short animation film, by the Basque director Aitor Oñederra, about a quiet reserved man. After his flight, a taxi brings Mr Mariano to a restaurant. The radio news reports on different political subjects. Mr. Mariano doesn’t respond to what is said. In the restaurant, a prestigious one that specialises in quality red meat, he has soup with fingers and an ear as an appetiser. The main dish is a brain. The waitress who brings the man his food looks very much like Angela Merkel. This is no coincidence.
Next to Mr. Mariano, Kim Jong-Un is gnawing meat from a large bone. Hillary Clinton sits at a table behind Kim, while Ali Khamenei is sipping a glass of red wine. Mr. Mariano doesn’t say a thing, not about the peculiar dishes, nor about the other guests. The man looks down and eats his food. He even ignores the secret and intimate rendezvous of Barack Obama and Nicolas Maduro, who are hiding in the bathroom where Mr. Mariano washes his hands.
I Said I Would Never Talk About Politics is animated in cartoonish black-and-white drawings, which contain some red-coloured details such as the wine and the meat. Especially the scenes that are set in the dark are reminiscent of the film noir style. Most of the scenes are accompanied by silence, which is exchanged for some horrifying sounds towards the end to emphasise the horrific atmosphere.Oñederra portrays world leaders as cannibals, while Mr. Mariano represents the world population that has to suffer the consequences.
Is this man able to keep his mouth shut and his eyes closed? No, he isn’t. In a surgery room where Merkel and Putin are dissecting monkeys, Mr Mariano gets nauseous. He throws up a red stream that flows along the Eiffel Tower, the Liberty statue, a warplane, a child holding a Hello Kitty bomb and the words “Stop Evictions”, among others. Mr. Mariano finally speaks about politics and not in a positive way. Will Putin and his axe forgive him for his criticism? You can probably guess the answer.
