Alexandra the Thin

The destiny of La Flaca Alejandra, whose real name is Marcia Merino, is intertwined with the last twenty years of Chilean history. 1965 – the influence of the Cuban Revolution on young Chileans during the Christian Democrat government of Eduardo Frei. 1970 – the victory of Salvador Allende and his three years of democratic socialism. 1973 – the coup d´état of General Augusto Pinochet, followed by seventeen years of dictatorship. 1989 – the presidential election which restored democracy to Chile. Yet General Pinochet continued as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, and the military hierarchy remained intact. The families of victims of the repression were able to initiate legal proceedings. General Manuel Contreras, former chief of DINA, the political police of the dictatorship, who was prosecuted in the United States for the murder of Orlando Letelier in Washington in 1975, was recently on trial in Chile and found guilty. But other trials have almost come to a standstill as the military refuse to give evidence have requested parliament to pass an act of oblivion and demanded complete amnesty. In Chile today, the past remains an answered question. At a very young age, Marcia Merino, known as La Flaca Alejandra was a leader of the Leftist Revolutionary Movement of Chile. After being arrested and tortured in 1974 by DINA, she betrayed the cause. For eighteen years, she worked for the intelligence services of Pinochet´s army. In 1993, she “changed sides” again, agreed to testify against the military and made a public apology. Carmen Castillo, a MIR militant who was arrested by DINA in October 1974 after the death of Miguel Enriquez, her companion and head of the Ressitance, became an exile in France. She wanted to meet La Flaca and to have this film made. It was shot in close collaboration with Guy Girand who gave this account its unusual form.