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DOCUMENTARY FILM
Lucanamarca. Directed by Carlos Cárdenas and Héctor Gálvez. Brooklyn: Icarus Films, 2009. 69 minutes. DVD. Color. $398.00.
This is a powerful and effective film. The documentary explores the causes, course and complex legacies of the April 3, 1983 massacre of 69 campesinos by militants of Peru's Shining Path. This mass killing was an act of retributive violence, intended to punish residents of the rural Ayacucho town of Santiago de Lucanamarca for their forceful rejection of the Maoist political party. Although many Lucanamarca campesinos initially sympathized with - and even joined - the Shining Path, numerous community residents attempted to stave off state military repression by publicly executing local Shining Patii commander Olegario Curitomay in March 1983. Just over a week after Curitomay's killing, approximately 60 Shining Path militants entered Lucanamarca and perpetrated the massacre.
The film begins nearly 20...