The Other Conquest
| The Other Conquest (La Otra Conquista) |
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| Directed by | Salvador Carrasco |
| Produced by | Plácido Domingo |
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Release date
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| Country | Mexico |
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Spanish Nahuatl |
| Budget | $3,000,000 |
The Other Conquest (Spanish: La Otra Conquista) is a 2000 Mexican feature film (re-released theatrically in 2008) written and directed by Salvador Carrasco and produced by Alvaro Domingo. Plácido Domingo, the world-renowned tenor, was the executive producer.
The film is a drama about the aftermath of the 1520s Spanish Conquest of Mexico told from the perspective of the indigenous Aztec people. It explores the social, religious, and psychological changes brought about by a historical process of colonization that both defined the American continent.
It is regarded by top critics (e.g., Kevin Thomas [1], Richard Nilsen [2], Larry Ratliff [3], among others) as one of the best cinematic explorations on the effects of colonization and also "one of the more astonishing feature film debuts in recent memory" [4].
The Other Conquest depicts the complex fusion that took place between the Catholic faith brought to Mexico by the Spaniards and the Aztec beliefs of the indigenous Native Americans.
It is May 1520 in the vast Aztec Empire, one year after the Spanish Conqueror Hernán Cortés arrived in Mexico. The Other Conquest opens with the infamous massacre of the Aztecs at the Great Temple of Tenochtitlan (what is now called Mexico City). The sacred grounds are covered with the countless bodies of priests and nobility slaughtered by the Spanish armies under Cortés' command. The lone Aztec survivor of the massacre is a young Indian scribe named Topiltzin [toˈpiɬt͡sin] (Damián Delgado). Topiltzin, who is the illegitimate son of the Aztec Emperor Moctezuma, survives the onslaught by burying himself under a stack of bodies. As if awakening from a dream, the young man rises from among the dead to find his mother murdered, the Spanish in power, and the dawn of a new era in his native land - a New World with alien leaders, language, customs... and God. Representing the New Order is the Spanish Friar Diego (José Carlos Rodríguez). His mission is to convert the "savage" natives into "civilized" Christians; to replace their human sacrifices and feathered deities with public Christenings and fealty to the Blessed Virgin Mary. With Topiltzin, Friar Diego faces his most difficult spiritual and personal challenge, for when Topiltzin is captured by Spanish troops and presented to Cortés (Iñaki Aierra), the Spanish Conqueror places Topiltzin's conversion under Friar Diego's care. Old world confronts the New as Topiltzin struggles to preserve his own beliefs, whilst Friar Diego attempts to impose his own. Moreover, throughout the film, a fundamental question arises: Who is really converting whom?
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