Tetro

Francis Ford Coppola described his movie Tetro (2009) as symbol of reinvention for his now more personal narratives (autobiographical in some respects) and opposing to the Hollywood mold that “makes the same movie over and over again”. “I view this as the second movie of my second career” Coppola commented about Tetro and the first of his 2000s’ movies “Youth Without Youth”. Both movies very different to the ones that made him famous like The Godfather trilogy, but in which cinematographic images of colourful but confusing memories, dreams, and traumas typical of Freudian psychoanalysis persevere. Following this new wave in Coppola’s work (but maintaining some of the recurrent themes of previous productions: black-and-white films, family dramas, and Italia American influences), Tetro comes with a plot about a truth that is being repressed.

And what better way to give a new face to the plot than to take it to a place like Latin America. Presented at first in black and white, the movie starts with the arrival of Bennie Tetrocini (Alden Ehrenreich) to La Boca neighbourhood in Buenos Aires looking for his older brother Angelo (Vicente Gallo), an unsuccessful novelist who now is known under the name of Tetro. Bennie wants to understand why Tetro moved to Argentina and why he hides his past. To unveil Tetro’s mystery, Bennie reads and completes an unfinished novel written by Tetro and that seems to be based on his life. This codified text allows every character to remember fractions of Tetro’s traumatic experiences like the death of his mother, and the treason of his first love with his father the opera conductor Carlos Tetrocini (whose fame always overshadowed Tetro). This text triggers flashbacks, but it also influences the creation of dreams and stories for a play that are the only colourful parts of the movie.

Convinced that his bother’s dark personality is explained by the traumatic stories of the novel (and aware of the potential of the material) Bennie decides to publish the novel to help his bother overcome the past, and produces a play using his brother name, Tetro. However, the cure ends up being worse than the disease. Like in psychoanalysis itself, interpretations might be relative to those trying to materialize what is in the mind. Even though dreams and memories are fragments of a truth, they are still a fantasy representation that projects something else, and in this case, it is also the repression of Bennie’s own memories.

Tetro means many things. It is the apocope of the surname Tetrocini. Tetro is also the new name that Angelo Tetrocini has decided to use in Argentina to start a new life. "Angelo no longer exists, I am Tetro" the protagonist exclaims, referring to Tetro as a totally new person, with no past (although in reality he is hiding one that torments him). But Tetro is also an artistic name. It represents the ambivalence of the family drama that is recurrent in Coppola's films. This ambivalence is also part of the family trauma that makes us see several flashbacks and surreal mental representations (quite expressive and colorful moments) are characteristics of neo-noir cinema. But despite the color scenes, most of the video is true to the black and white of the classic noir.

In this movie, the way in which Argentina is portrayed contributes a lot to the family drama of the plot and to the style of the movie. The streets of La Boca neighbourhood are surrounded by a bohemian life environment: people going out all the time, enjoying street art and open sexuality, and meeting at nightclubs to present their new creations. Music, theater, literature and the importance of art as a whole in Tetro’s life help to build a plot charged with emotions and mystery. Those same elements maintain the noir genre though it is adapted to new audiences and times, as the New York Times called it: “Family Dynamics, Without Bullets”.

Assassination Tango

Robert Duvall writes, directs and stars in 2002's Assassination Tango, a movie about a seasoned hit man who is contracted to do a job in Argentina. John J. is an older man who lives in Atlantic City with his girlfriend and his girlfriend's daughter, Jenny, whom he loves like a father. He is also a contract killer. His agent, a salsa club owner named Frankie, informs him of a three-day job in Buenos Aires, Argentina, which will pay more than the usual hit. John J. agrees with the condition that he return in three days for Jenny's birthday, and flies Varig to Buenos Aires. He is met by a man named Miguel, who takes John J. to his home in the city, where his brother Orlando and his uncle and aunt have prepared a meal. Here, John J. learns that the man he is to kill is General Humberto Rojas, an ex-military leader who committed atrocious human rights crimes in the eighties and remains immune to prosecution. One of the victims of Rojas' crimes is a relative of Miguel and Orlando's family, and they cannot be at peace until he is killed. They have organized a hotel for John J. near Rojas' home, and the assassination is to be done from its rooftop into Rojas' yard, where Rojas takes tea every evening. John J.'s other contact in the city is Tony Manas, an exercise-club owner who will provide John J. with the necessary weapons for the job. While visiting Manas, John J. sees a couple dancing tango in the club. This sparks his fascination for this complex and elegant dance.

The next day, Orlando and Miguel have bad news for John J.: General Rojas has had an accident on his horse and must remain in the hospital for two to three weeks. John J. must stay there until Rojas returns to his house, where he can then kill him. John J. is very angry to be missing Jenny's birthday, but he must remain until the job is done. To kill time as he waits for Rojas' return, John J. wanders around Buenos Aires, taking in the city. He chances upon a tango club, where he is entranced by the dancing of a beautiful woman, Manuela. He watches her dance every evening for the next week, after which he approaches her and asks her to perhaps give him some tango lessons. She agrees. Meanwhile, he has been given a small gun by Tony Manas, but he requires a .22 with a scope if he is to do the assassination properly. He also spends a night with a prostitute, asking her to call him "Papito". He and Manuela spend a lot of time together, talking and dancing tango. He discovers the rich and mysterious world of the Argentine tango, and how much it means to the people of Buenos Aires, who dance it until they are very old. Without him knowing, Miguel and Orlando are watching his every move. But John J. is an experienced man, and has secretly taken an apartment nearby as a potential hiding place if things go wrong.

One morning, General Rojas finally returns home. John J. waits for the evening, when Rojas takes tea in his garden. Instead of sniping him from the hotel rooftop, John J. goes to his gate, kills his security guard, and stalks into the garden holding a bunch of flowers. Pretending to be a bum from the street, he shoots Rojas in the heart and then runs away. He then returns to his apartment and hides. That night, as he waits, safe, in the apartment, police search his hotel room. Miguel and Orlando are arrested, but their interrogation is interrupted by a contact of theirs in the Federal Police, who gets them off the hook. This man is also happy that Rojas is dead. It seems members of the police knew about the assassination from the very beginning, and let it happen; however, it becomes evident that John J. was supposed to have been captured. John J. must get out of Buenos Aires. He realizes that in his hotel room, he has forgotten a pair of riding boots that he bought for his stepdaughter Jenny. Risking his life, he returns to the police-protected hotel room to get the boots. He gets the boots and escapes within an inch of his life, running from police gunshots. The following morning, he takes a ferry to Uruguay, from which he is to fly home. In the airport bathroom, a man approaches him and asks to see his documents. John J. kills him and stuffs him in a stall. Then he boards his flight to Atlantic City, where he is happily reunited with his girlfriend and Jenny.

John J. has had a tough life living in the criminal world of Atlantic City, but he has softened in his old age. His love for his girlfriend and Jenny and the happiness he gets from having a family bring out a kind old man, but he also grapples with getting old and losing his place in the world, and shows an aggressive streak when people comment on his age. In Argentina, John J. comes to terms with this internal battle. Argentinian culture is one which prizes its older citizens and includes them in every aspect of life, unlike America, which is a culture of youth that marginalizes the old. The people he encounters in Argentina teach him that the old have an important place in their society: the hotel-owner cares for and loves his elderly mother; Manuela's elderly aunt and uncle are passionate and energetic people who dance vigorously; tango clubs are filled with elderly people who are often the best dancers in the club. Manuela, who is a beautiful woman in her early thirties, shows romantic interest in John J., despite the fact that he is much older than she is. For Manuela's elderly aunt, "Tango is everything. It is love, it is hate...it is life!". She is right; tango clubs are places where all ages are represented. Children, sexy young women, mysterious pony-tailed men, and older folks dance the tango. Argentina is a place where life is celebrated at every age. Argentina rejuvenates John J..

Not that the film doesn't show some negative aspects of Argentinian culture. Underlying many scenes is the unmistakable military presence characteristic of many Latin American cultures. The military is still very much an important force in Argentina. The atrocities committed by the military governments' wars of subversion in the seventies and eighties are not forgotten, nor have they been reconciled; Rojas is just one example of many military leaders who are known for their crimes but have gone unpunished. The people of Argentina are not free from these dictatorships as long as these men are alive and their "disappeared" family members are still unaccounted for. Another negative aspect shown is the level of corruption that pervades the judicial system. Miguel and Orlando's connections in the Federal Police make them immune to punishment for the crime they've committed. When John J. hears of their connection, he is surprised, but they tell him, "This is Argentina". The juxtaposition of the passionate, warm world of the tango and the hard, sharp-edged world of politics show the complex and multi-faceted nature of Argentinian culture.

You Were Never Lovelier

You Were Never Lovelier (1942) has charm, rhythm, and leaves you wanting to take a spin in Fred Astaire’s tap shoes. . . What more could one ask from a musical comedy?

The first character to appear is Robert "Bob" Davis (Fred Astaire), a gambling, grinning, tap-dancing New Yorker down in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to try his luck at getting a contract to perform at the prestigious Hotel Acuña. The only thing standing in his way is the grumpy hotel owner, Mr. Eduardo Acuña (Adolphe Menjou), who speaks his mind and lets you know when you’re not wanted or, in this case, when Bob’s not wanted. Fortunately, at the hotel Bob runs into his old friend and bandleader Xavier Cugat (played by himself) and the two conspire for Bob to sing at Mr. Acuña’s oldest daughter’s wedding the following night. Now, the fact that this is the wedding of the eldest daughter is quite significant, as the Acuña family tradition states that the four daughters must marry in order of age, eldest to youngest. This leaves the two youngest, Ceci and Lita, who already have suitors, in a bind because their second eldest sister, Maria (Rita Hayworth), has no interest whatsoever in marriage--to the extent that when she catches her elder sister’s bouquet at the reception and is immediately surrounded by admirers, she promptly shows them all the cold shoulder.

Bob puts on a pleasant show at the wedding and then on the veranda he runs into Maria, whom he immediately tries to charm but all his (disappointing) attempts fall through. We later learn from Mr. Acuña that Maria has been waiting for her ideal "knight in shining armour" since she was fifteen; he and her sisters are by now quite worried that this knight will never show. So Mr. Acuña takes matters into his own hands and begins writing anonymous love letters to his indifferent daughter, who eventually becomes unabashedly captivated by her secret admirer.

Bob arrives at Mr. Acuña’s office to demand a contract, but instead takes up pretending to be the bellboy and has to deliver the latest love letter to Maria. She misinterprets this by thinking that Bob is her secret admirer and falls head-over-heels for the aloof American. When Mr. Acuña realizes what has happened he immediately explains the situation to Bob and enlists him to let Maria down gently in exchange for a contract at the hotel. But that night at dinner, things do not go as smoothly as Mr. Acuña had planned, as Bob and Maria discover they have more in common than they bargained for. They spend the night singing to one another and twirling around the veranda in unison, and continue to act this way even behind Mr. Acuña’s back. A few days later, when Bob arrives at the Acuñas’ 25th wedding anniversary, Mr. Acuña is almost furious, which prompts him to blackmail Bob into leaving or he’ll tell Maria that her sweetheart never wrote her the mysterious letters. The plot is then revealed to all when Mrs. Acuña catches Mr. Acuña writing a final love letter and Bob quickly explains the situation to avoid any rumours that Mr. Acuña is cheating on his wife. This puts Bob in the father’s good books, but the daughter goes back to her old self and the cold shoulder. With the help of the rest of the Acuña family, Bob tries everything to get Maria back: love letters, orchids, singing telegrams. But nothing works until he rides up to the Acuña’s house (and into Maria’s fantasy) as the "knight in shining armour." He thinks she has rejected him when he makes a fool of himself dismounting, but this seems to warm her heart even more, and they carry on pirouetting around the garden in front of two happy Acuña parents and the two younger, and even happier, Acuña daughters.

This film highlights Buenos Aires as a cosmopolitan and sophisticated city, with all its characters being from the upper class/aristocratic society, a subjective view all on its own. The city itself is visually absent from the movie, with the exception of a few shots of national monuments, such as the famous Plaza de Mayo, in the opening scene; rather, the focus is on locations such as Mr. Acuña’s office and home. This lack of connection to the actual culture of Argentina allows the movie to indulge in immigrant characters (Mr. Acuña’s parents left Brittany to come to Buenos Aires) and the music, dance, and dress of American culture. This, not surprisingly, almost transplants the audience from South to North America, instead of the other way around which was, interestingly, what happened in Bob's case.

There is no overt mention of World War II in You Were Never Lovelier, but this doesn’t relieve the glaring observation of copious amounts of US propaganda coinciding with an attempt for an increase in inter-continental relations, such as Maria's comment to Bob that "We love your North American music and dances down here," and Bob's stated admiration for both the city of Buenos Aires and its people. At the time of the film’s release, it was not clear as to whether Argentina was allying with the Axis countries in the war or with the US; although it often the country’s ports would open to American ships and stay closed to ships belonging to the Axis. The clandestine theme of the US encroaching upon Argentina is a stamp of the North American superpower’s desire for more influence in the Southern continent, and a possible demonstration of the filmmakers' intention. On this note, perhaps the best subliminal message passed on from the film is when Maria asserts that her new American lover is “not leaving South America if [she] can help it”; and in the end Bob, of course, continues his stay in Buenos Aires.

Too Many Girls

Three rows of attractive football players singing in unison begin the musical comedy Too Many Girls (1940), revealing the lighthearted nature of this "boy-meets-girl, boy-loses-girl, boy-gets-girl" genre of film.

First we meet Clint Kelly (Richard Carlson), an All-American university football hero trying tirelessly to convince his friend Manuel (Desi Arnaz), a foreign student from Argentina and up-and-coming football star, to come play at Princeton when the fall term begins. Manuel can’t bear the fact that all his life he has grown up around men: in school, at home, at work, on the football field. He confides to Clint that all he wants is to meet some women. Clint is confronted in his recruitment quest by football heroes Jojo (Eddie Bracken) and Al (Hal Le Roy), who also want to draft Manuel to play for their own Ivy League universities. The four are discussing the matter at the restaurant where Clint and Manuel work when, all of a sudden, wealthy businessman Mr. Casey comes in to eat. Through conversations the football stars are not meant to hear, we learn that Mr. Casey is having trouble keeping his daughter Consuelo (Lucille Ball) under control. Casey offer Clint a job, but the young man doesn’t accept until he sees the beautiful Consuelo, whereupon all four boys are love-struck and eagerly sign up for the task. Their mission just happens to be to work as bodyguards to Consuelo, employment which comes with an anti-romantic, hands-off clause. Consuelo, ignorant of her father’s plan, has decided to go to Pottawatomie College in New Mexico, a country-bumpkin, middle-of-nowhere school that only plays football on Fridays . . . what have these boys gotten themselves into?

In New Mexico, they are surrounded by students of all types: cowboys, Native Americans, Mexicans, and sorority girls. The school is closed due to a utility payment debt, a situation quickly remedied by the four undercover football heroes, of whom Manuel takes the credit for generously donating the cash, and the entire school then bursts into joyous song and dance (betcha didn’t see that one comin’!). The college proves to harbor some strange antics, as when the sorority girls asking Consuelo, as they put her through her pledge, “What do you consider your ultimate goal in life?” To which she answers, “A man.” It soon becomes clear that this school, with ten girls for every man, runs on cheesy one-liners, impromptu songs, dating, and school dances, one of which has Manuel leading a Mexican band to a saucy, Latin American beat.

The boys seem to be fitting in fine, until Consuelo begins to date playwright Beverly Waverly, her secret lover and reason for attending Pottawatomie. Clint uses every ploy up his sleeve to keep the two apart, and soon finds the anti-romantic clause a nuisance as he begins to fall in love with his employer’s daughter. Meanwhile, it has been discovered that the boys are football stars and all four are enlisted to play for the Pottawatomie team, which they guide to greatness and fame over the course of the season. After Clint gives in to his urges and begins dating Consuelo, the truth is revealed about the boys' real purpose at Pottawatomie and all four, with their enraged detainee, must return to the east coast, on Mr. Casey's orders. The town is outraged that their football stars plan to miss the last game and almost capture them with a lynch mob, but the day is saved by the benevolent Mr. Waverly who convinces the them to play. The stands go wild as the Pottawatomie team scores touchdown after touchdown to victory, and at the fervent after-party the entire student body becomes a dancing, singing, smiling fusion of bodies led by the charming young playboy Manuel, with an enormous bongo drum slung around his neck. And so concludes a happy-go-lucky film as the handsome leading men all end up with girls on their arms and grins on their faces.

Manuel’s Argentine, American-football playing, smooth-talking character appears to be the epitome of the fantasizing foreigner coming to America with big dreams and big talent. Everywhere he turns he is confronted with good fortune: a plethora of football scholarships, a school with more girls than he can handle, and a student body that loves his swaying hips and Spanish accent. The prospects presented to Manuel showcase the abundance of opportunity and success often associated with a foreign perspective of America. Even though he is sought after, the movie still presents a double standard of race, calling Manuel the “South American youngster” and the other football players “All-Americans”.

Beyond the fact that Desi Arnaz is a Cuban playing an Argentine, the film throws in references to general Hispanic culture, such as when Manuel sings a song with the lyrics “Spic and span . . . spic and Spanish." Too Many Girls is fraught with cultural references to the point of becoming ridiculous. The final jumbled scene of dancing and frolic is dizzy with action as it hops to a thrilling conga beat, provided by Manuel and showcasing Arnaz's talents as a Cuban bandmaster. The beat is tribal and seems ethnically out of place for a New Mexican college. Though the school does entertain cultures of white, Native American, and Mexican, it also throws these ethnicities together into an unintelligible hodgepodge of chaotic dance and song, and tops it off with the presumably Native American tribal markings on Manuel’s bongo drum. Perhaps Gustavo Pérez Firmat best articulates the overall feel of this movie when he argues that "Too Many Girls meshes too many cultures" (Life on the Hyphen, 54).

The Gaucho

The original programme notes to The Gaucho, while emphasizing the painstaking research that lies behind the film's script and scenography, state that:

Douglas [Fairbanks] has always held that "things as they are" are never as appealing as "things as we would like to see them."

But what then does this film indicate about what its audience would like to see?

The answer would appear to be: miracles, shrines, macho Argentine country-folk, Lupe Velez's heaving bosom, and the power of religion to redeem even the most inveterate of criminals.

Meanwhile, we would like to see gauchos, if Douglas Fairbanks's portrayal is anything to go by, as raucous, rambunctious folk, who like to drink, dance, and fight, are athletic and a hit with the ladies, and who smoke like a chimney. Fairbanks's cigarette is his constant prop. At one point he swallows it up within his mouth while he pauses to kiss Velez, the mountain girl, only for it to pop out again shortly afterwards.

As always, however, the gauchos are a dying breed. (And it ain't just the lung cancer that'll get 'em.)

Though this film portrays them at their peak, overwhelming Andean villages and evil dictatorial usurpers alike, it also shows the gaucho tamed. Struck by a dreaded lurgy (the "black doom"), a mysterious illness that makes his hand black and numb, Fairbanks's un-named gaucho is about to commit suicide until the saintly girl of the shrine leads him to where Mary Pickford (playing the Virgin Mary) can cure him and turn his life around. Converted to Christianity, he determines to make an honest woman of his lover, Velez, and so presumably an honest, no longer gaucho, man of himself.

The Gaucho was touted for its lavish and expansive sets. The Andes here are near vertical cliffs, within which the people live in no more than caves. The plains, on the other hand, are bedecked with palm trees and throng with cattle for as far as the eye can see.

But who tends these cattle? Hardly anyone here works. Aside from the bartender in the village cantina and the padre at the shrine, the people are divided into three roughly equal parts: beggars, soldiers, and bandits.

This is a story set in some mythical, premodern past. The Latin America presented here is almost entirely a generic image of rural poverty, militaristic tyranny, and popular religiosity, The gaucho bolas, horsemanship, and spurs are the particularistic details around which the shallow characterization is spun. But everything blurs in a haze of cigarette smoke and the dust raised by stampeding cattle.