Interview: Mexican Golden Globe Winner Actor Bernal presents in Cannes movie about poetry

Gael Garcia Bernal, renowned Mexican actor presenting the movie "Neruda" at the ongoing 69th Cannes Film Festival in the Director's Fortnight selection, underlined the importance of poetry as art.

"Poetry can give us a lot of answers, the American scientist Carl Sagan said 'in order to deal with our insignificance the only way to survive is to love, it's a biological function and poetry is there to put it our lives," Bernal said in an interview with Xinhua in Cannes.

"Neruda" is about the tumultuous and adventurous life of the Chilean writer Pablo Neruda. In the movie, Bernal plays the role of the policeman who has to arrest the poet.

Questioned about his relation with director, the actor confessed "I feel very free with him, then I'm very open in terms of film projects. With Pablo Larrain, I feel like we were made for each other, because he is a very free filmmaker and I enjoy so much being on the set and spending everyday with him trying out new things. Important is also that the sense of humor is very poignant in our relation".

"My character is clearly right wing and a little bit fascist, he is a proto-fascists who has accepted the defeat of the Second World War and he is envious and resentful to poets," Bernal explained, adding that "he is then a son of a prostitute and we gave him as well the elements of his humanity because he is very gentle with women, he could play the misogynist but he was born in the outskirts and the poetry of Neruda didn't get to him".

He also expressed his personal interests in reading poetry, philosophy, science and sociological essays.

Referring to his professional choices, Bernal sad that "nowadays you don't need to go to Hollywood to keep on doing film, because there is a much more brave new world out there".

"I'm not doing a film for geographical belongings. For me, to do like Motorcycle Diaries (2004) or whatever they offered me at that time, there is no competition with this movie I played in. In the Latin part of the world, I feel more free," the Mexican actor continued. Endit