On Dawidowicz's The Life of Simón Bolívar

A film script tracing the life and achievements of the Latin American liberator Simón Bolívar has been archived in the special collections of the University of Miami Library since the 1980s. Accessible only on site, this peculiar thirteen-page film script was never published or filmed. It is part of the personal files of Simón Daro Dawidowicz (1937–1990), a Jewish businessman who was fascinated by Bolívar's life story, Latin America, and the Pan-American union. Dawidowicz never produced any films; indeed, he was not a part of the filmmaking community at all. He was the president of the Bolivarian Society of Colombia and managed the Daro Dawidowicz Foundation, both organizations dedicated to the preservation and dissemination of studies related to Simón Bolívar. Dawidowicz envisioned making a film that would focus mostly on Bolívar's personal life and accomplishments, including important elements of his religious beliefs and his connection to Jewish traditions. (He begins the script by describing Bolívar's parents, his house in Caracas, and the church ceremony on the day he was baptized.)

This film script was never brought to the big screen, and it remains a forgotten artifact of history in one of the six boxes that comprise the Dawidowicz collection at the University of Miami Library. The library database describes the script in Spanish as a "Guión para un film cinematográfico sobre la personalidad, la vida y la obra de Simón Bolívar" ("script for a cinematographic film about the personality, the life and the work of Simón Bolívar"). It notes that this screenplay was published in Bogotá, Colombia, by the Daro Dawidowicz Foundation between 1980 and 1989, but does not specify a more exact date. The record simply cites the item as published in "[198?]."

The plot outlined in the thirteen-page script summarizes 121 proposed scenes that depict the most important moments of Bolívar's life, beginning with his childhood and ending with his death in Santa Marta, Colombia, in 1830. The scenes encompass the multifaceted and prolific life of the liberator, following a chronology that includes the most pivotal events Bolívar experienced and achieved in his personal life and as a politician. The script is distinctive in offering a different perception of the commonly depicted image of Simón Bolívar—as portrayed, for example, in Simón Bolívar (interpretación), the first film script about Bolívar, written in 1939 by José de Vasconcelos; and even in Simón Bolívar (1942), the first film about the liberator, by the Mexican film director Miguel Contreras Torres.

Dawidowicz begins his film script by outlining the main three aspects of his plot, encompassing Bolívar's personality, life story, and achievements. The script then describes the early days of Bolívar's family, the Bolívar house in Caracas, Venezuela, at the end of the eighteenth century, and the chapel where Bolívar was baptized, along with a brief account of Bolívar's loss of his parents at a young age. The script also recounts young Bolívar's education under the tutelage of his teachers Andrés Bello and Simón Rodríguez. It describes Bolívar's first voyage abroad, during which he passed through Mexico and then arrived in Madrid, Spain, where several of his family members lived.

In Spain Bolívar met and married María Teresa del Toro y Alayza, before departing for rural San Mateo in Aragua, Venezuela, where he had a home, farm, and job with the government. After María Teresa suddenly passed away from a tropical illness, Bolívar returned to Europe, and thus began a formative journey that broadened his personal vision and fostered his strong geopolitical perspective. In Europe Bolívar visited Lisbon, Madrid, Paris, Milan, Venice, Rome, Naples, and Hamburg. On his way back to Venezuela, he visited Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston. Upon his return to Caracas, he started a revolution against the...