The Judge and the General 2008

The Judge and the General is a deeply personal, meticulously observed documentary about a Chilean judge who descends into the moral labyrinth of Pinochet’s dictatorship, a journey he himself describes as the “abyss.” Throughout the film, the narrative threads together personal memory, legal duty, and a nation’s struggle with its dark history, presenting a portrait of how one man’s refusal to look away eventually collides with his own past and the weight of history.

From the outset, the court room and the courtroom’s echoes frame the story with real-world gravity. The film situates its inquiries within the broader shadow of a coup and its aftermath, including archive footage of Augusto Pinochet and Salvador Allende, reminding viewers that the path Guzmán walks is inseparable from a country reeling from political violence and human rights abuses. The documentary also threads in perspectives from others tied to that era, including Richard Nixon and Jack Straw, signaling how foreign and domestic pressures shaped Chile’s fate even as Guzmán’s own life choices—what he believed and what he did not—began to catch up with him.

A central arc follows Guzmán’s unexpected assignment in 1998, chosen by lottery, to preside over the first criminal cases against Pinochet. The film makes clear that Chilean judges are the ones who investigate, prosecute, and try these cases, and Guzmán’s path into these proceedings is presented as both a legal mission and a journey into personal conscience. The documentary follows two intersecting investigations that broaden the scope of the crimes under scrutiny. The first centers on Manuel Donoso, a young sociology professor who was detained, tortured, and killed in the chaotic months following the coup. The camera moves between the present-day disinterment of Donoso’s remains and the wife’s intimate retelling of his arrest and the brutality he endured, widening the lens to show how many families endured similar fates and how the system attempted to erase them.

The second investigation takes the viewers into the case of Cecilia (Chechi) Castro, whose family’s harrowing tale echoes a modern tragedy of survival against a ruthless regime. Cecilia’s mother, Edita, faced a harrowing choice to reveal her granddaughter’s hiding place to the secret police in order to save a life. The documentary follows Guzmán and a team of detectives as they pursue leads that take them to off-shore locales and even beneath the surface of the sea. Underwater cameras capture the stark images of divers recovering rails that had been tied to the bodies of political prisoners thrown into the ocean—an emblem of the brutality Guzmán is trying to bring to light.

Throughout the film, Guzmán’s past as a clerk in the Court of Appeals during the harsh years of repression looms large. He remembers contributing to the denial of countless habeas corpus petitions on behalf of victims who disappeared into secret detention centers, a memory that haunts him as he weighs the moral costs of pursuing indictment. The narrative contrasts his past actions with the weight of new evidence and the evolving conscience that pushes him to question whether he should indict Pinochet after all. In moments of reflection, Guzmán acknowledges how his own perspective hardened—and how the process of investigation changes not just him, but everyone around him.

The documentary gives voice to Guzmán’s inner turmoil in vivid terms. He confronts the claim that he is “the good German,” a critique of someone blind to the crimes that surround him until a chance investigation forces him to see. The film captures his confession of awakening: “I would say it opened the eyes of my soul.” This moment crystallizes the tension at the heart of the film—between loyalty to established institutions and the imperative to seek justice for victims, even when it means reexamining one’s long-held beliefs.

The narrative voice also widens its scope by featuring perspectives from the courtroom’s wider circle, including others who were involved in or affected by these events. Mónica González, a journalist who endured imprisonment under Pinochet, appears in the broader mosaic, as do other figures connected to Chile’s struggle for accountability. The presence of Ricardo Lagos, who would later serve as president, and Mónica Pérez Marín in archival form, helps situate Guzmán’s investigations within a national timeline of political change and legal reckoning.

As the film moves toward its culmination, it returns to the troubling spectacle of Pinochet’s funeral in Santiago in December 2006, where taunts from supporters evoke the era’s killings and abuses. These moments of public confrontation force Guzmán to confront the full arc of history—the hatred, the chaos, and the attempts to rewrite or erase it. The documentary ultimately asks whether Guzmán’s courageous but controversial inquiries will be vindicated by his peers: will his colleagues, attorneys, and judges stand with him or doubt him as more evidence comes into focus?

The strength of The Judge and the General lies in its patient, unflinching examination of a single jurist’s conscience within the larger crucible of Chile’s recent past. It invites viewers to watch not just as observers of history, but as witnesses to a man’s transformation under the pressure of truth, accountability, and the unresolved questions that linger when a society confronts its darkest chapters. The film, through its two tightly interwoven investigations and the personal testimonies that accompany them, offers a nuanced, emotionally resonant account that stays true to the complex fabric of Chile’s turbulent decades. It leaves audiences with a sense of unresolved tension—an invitation to readers and viewers to consider what justice requires when memory collides with duty, and when the pursuit of accountability challenges the very institutions that once shielded those who committed crimes.