Los archivos del cardenal (The Archives of the Cardinal) is a Chilean TV series that premiered on 21 July 2011 on Televisión Nacional de Chile (TVN) and was based on the human rights defense work carried out by the Vicariate of Solidarity during the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet (1973–1990).
The first season of the series starts with Ramón Sarmiento, a lawyer and member of a high class family who had suffered the expropriation of his haciendas during the agrarian reform under the government of Eduardo Frei Montalva.
After reading the three volumes of the book Chile: La memoria prohibida (1989), written by Eugenio Ahumada, Augusto Góngora and Rodrigo Atria – one of the first documents about the human rights violations that occurred during the dictatorship and prior to the Rettig Report – she realized that the testimonies, due to their intensity and drama, could perfectly become chapters of a series.
The Center for Research and Publications (CIP) of Diego Portales University's Faculty of Communication and Literature seeks to rescue, through the website Los Casos de la Vicaría, those real cases and some of the protagonists, as well as accounting for how the events were covered by the mainstream media of the time.
The president of National Renewal, Carlos Larraín, took advantage of a meeting of the expanded political committee that was held at La Moneda Palace to express his annoyance over the TVN broadcast of Los archivos del cardenal.
During the last 20 years, a hard center left and leading journalistic class (using expression as a synonym of that assigned to politicians), which manages the editorial, informative, and reporting line with a clear favorable intention to the Concertación or what is left of it, was organized in that medium.Regarding the series, Cardemil expressed in his column: The context and intention of the series (technically admirable, with pure and ill-spoken terrorist youth, non-pedophile priest, idealistic girl, farmer ashamed of being a boss, judge implacable with the uniforms, suspense in background music and environmental nicotine that brings to mind the good French cinema) is an abuse of public silver, and violates, from end to end, TVN's own "programmatic and editorial orientations", which obliges it to present balanced facts and opinions, recognizing the diversity of perspectives and sensitivities that occur in the country, in addition to promoting "unity", "pluralism", "objectivity", and "rigor in the explanation of the facts".The PPD deputy Tucapel Jiménez Fuentes [es] referred to the criticisms of his colleague Cardemil, saying that "a country without memory has no future."
The song "Santiago de Chile" by Silvio Rodríguez was composed in 1975 and is part of Los Bunkers' tribute album to the Cuban singer-songwriter, Música libre [es], which they play other compositions from when the episodes end.
Before the screening, a letter of greeting was read by Estela Ortiz, widow of José Manuel Parada [es], one of the three murdered professionals, a former official of the Vicariate of Solidarity, whose case inspired the last chapter.
The singer Manuel García closed the day, who together with the musician Camilo Salinas [es] interpreted the songs "Déjame pasar la vida" and "Te recuerdo Amanda" by Víctor Jara.
The team that created the articles compiled in the book was directed by Andrea Insunza and Javier Ortega, both UDP researchers, and depended on the participation of CIPER director Mónica González and the journalists Francisca Skoknic, Juan Cristóbal Peña, Alejandra Matus, and Ana María Sanhueza.