Papa Perez (review)

The parallels of theatricality between the newsreels of yesterday and the television news of today are alarming. The manipulative quality to which viewers have been subjected and to which they adjust themselves continues . Yesterday's Witness, like Raymond Fielding's book The American Newsreel (upon which much of it has been based), is valuable as a reminder of a past genre. But the subject deserves a more searching treatment. Greg Bush PAPA PEREZ (35 min., color, 16mm) Cecropia Films, 1979. Kathleen Dowdey's Papa Perez is a film about the Perez dynasty of Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana. It is a short film—only 35 minutes—and as a result it can do little more than present a brief sketch of the origins of the Perez dominion and then move on to its economic and ideological results. The economic results are obvious: a vast inequality of wealth legitimized and protected by the Perez' domination of Plaquemines Parish's major political and financial institutions. The ideological dimensions are interesting, though no less predictable. The Perez family sees itself as utterly benign, with the eldest sons, Leander Perez II and Chalin 0. Perez, extolling their selfless virtues and benevolent public service. This sort of self-justification is always amusing—even ..comic— but it is not at all unexpected. Ultimately, Papa Perez never goes beyond the obvious, but neither does it hammer away at it. It always allows the viewer to see the blatant as if it were a discovery, and this is certainly a virtue. The major problem with the film is that it is simply not long enough to really explore the questions it raises, and one can only wish that Ms. Dowdey had more time—and probably money—to investigate Plaquemines Parish with greater intensity. Thomas H. Cook 43 ...