Intrigue

In the year 1987, in a house located in a wealthy district of Mexico City, a few 20th century-celebrated personages were photographed in a private meeting. Almost three decades later, a photo of that meeting was published on social media. Among the journalists, writers, academics and artists depicted in that picture was an infamous president and a mysterious guest: a busty doll which might have had something -or nothing- to do with the old controversial relationship between power and the intellectuals. This documentary unveils the story behind that meeting as well as the origin of that peculiar doll.—Abdul Marcos

During the eighties in Mexico City, a group of intellectuals known as The Angangueo Athenaeum, inspired by the work of journalists Manuel Buendía and Fernando Benítez, used to meet frequently to have private conversations -off the record- regarding topical issues.

This group, made up of writers, artists, journalists and academics, was convened one afternoon in September 1987 at the home of economist and environmentalist Iván Restrepo, in order to continue the tradition of this gathering. Only this time there was the special presence of two characters: Carlos Salinas de Gortari, a candidate for the centrist political party to the presidency (PRI), who would eventually become one of the most controversial politicians in Mexico; and a stuffed doll with a huge bosom who mysteriously managed to sneak into the group photo taken that day.

Now, almost thirty years later, this old photograph has been published on social media baffling its users, making them wonder the reason as to the meeting of such characters, as well as, not only the origin of this strange disproportionate doll, but also the possibility that its existence may have something to do with the relationship between power and the intellectual class in Mexico.

These mysteries are solved thanks to the testimonies of some surviving members of The Angangueo Athenaeum (Elena Poniatowska and Iván Restrepo), as well as a new generation of writers and political scientists (including Denise Dresser, Pável Granados and Fabrizio Mejía). The Busty Doll reveals both biographical data and anecdotal stories of the members of this intellectual group, as well as historical, political and cultural facts of Mexico in the late eighties.

From the issue of consanguinity between writer Margo Su and an actress murdered because of her alleged ties with the Mexican mafia, to the Nobel laureate in literature Gabriel García Márquez being a political intermediary between USA and Cuba, and the methods employed by the centrist political party (PRI) to build "clienteles", The Busty Doll is a trip through time through which, with a critical eye and a little humor, interviewees analyze a Mexico marked simultaneously by progress and corruption.