Biker rebels with a cause

When Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara was 23, he was neither revolutionary nor Cuban but an Argentinian medical student off on a motorcycling adventure with his friend Alberto Granado. On an ancient bike, the pair travelled across Latin America to a leper colony in Peru - when the bike broke down, they hitched; when they ran out of money, they fell back on charity or cunning.

'In Latin America, Guevara's journals of the trip became cult reading,' explains Brazilian director Walter Salles, who has melded the diaries with Granado's book to produce The Motorcycle Diaries. It features Gael GarcÌa Bernal as Guevara and Rodrigo De La Serna - a cousin of Guevara's - as Granado. 'This project was very tempting because I could talk about Guevara before the time in his life that's known. This is about two guys travelling, acquiring political and ethical understanding. Still, it was also sacred territory, so we had to investigate with care.'

The film, which took five years to make, derives a lot of its energy from the fact it's a road movie, like Salles's Central Station, and Bernal's second hit Y Tu Mam· TambiÈn. 'With young societies like ours, I think road movies help us see how we're evolving,' says Salles. 'They're a way to focus on new frontiers being defined.'

Guevara was executed by a CIAbacked firing squad in Bolivia in 1967, aged 39. Salles hopes his film will help rescue him from his international, decontextualised status and send people in search of the real Che.

The Motorcycle Diaries (15) opens the Edinburgh Film Festival tonight, before selected national release on August 27. www.edfilmfest.org.uk