In Silverman’s telling, the filmmaker, Joris Ivens, a Dutchman working in the United States, is already an undercover infiltrator for Soviet interests when the Spanish Civil War breaks out in 1936. Ivens was a real filmmaker, and his movie “The Spanish Earth,” released in 1937, was a real cause célèbre among leftists and artists. The frenemies Ernest Hemingway and John Dos Passos did write the screenplay, as Silverman relates. (He imagines shooting part of the documentary from an ant’s point-of-view, or a raindrop’s.) Nor, for all his faults, was Hemingway (Danny Wolohan) so complete a buffoon, given to shouting such hollow nonsense.

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Persons: ”, Jen Silverman’s “, ” That’s, Joris Ivens, “, Rich, Franco, Ivens, Ernest Hemingway, John Dos Passos, Silverman, Andrew Burnap, Hemingway, Danny Wolohan, Dos Passos, Erik Lochtefeld Organizations: Republican, Rich Fascist Locations: Jen Silverman’s “ Spain, United States, Spanish, Spain, Dos