Review: “Juan y Eva” an intimate movie about Evita

A new film about Evita focuses on her relationship with Peron.

by Amy Ramirez, contributing blogger

Juan y Eva is a re-telling of the love story between Argentina’s most famous politicians, President Juan Domingo Perón and Eva “Evita” Duarte. The film takes place after the earthquake on January 1944 in San Juan which leads Colonel Juan Perón to meet radio actress Eva Duarte at a relief effort to help the victims. As they say, the rest is history.

President of Argentina Cristina Fernández de Kirchner highly recommended the movie during a speech. She asked the audience if she and her husband (ex-President Nestor Kirchner, who died tragically last year) would ever be the subject of a movie like this.

Director Paula de Luque’s (El Vestido, 2009) rendition of the courtship and eventual marriage of Juan and Eva Perón stays away from the political underpinnings of a better-known story and focuses on the couple’s romantic relationship. It stars renowned theater actor Osmar Núñez and TV/film star Julieta Díaz (who dyed her black locks blond for the part).

For from the idolized (or demonized) portraits of these political leaders that the Argentine public is used to, there is a deliberate focus placed on both the imperfection and the beauty of the human condition. We see Eva’s jealous fits of rage, and Juan being condescending to one of Eva’s friends and losing his temper with his inferiors.

Ginger Gentile and “Goals for Girls: The Movie” on Expat Daily News

by Tracey Chandler, contributing blogger

Read the in-depth interview on Expat Daily News that Ginger Gentile gave about the documentary film “Goals for Girls: The Movie,” that is being filmed at present by San Telmo Productions, Buenos Aires.
http://www.expatdailynewssouthamerica.com/2010/06/expat-interview-with-documentary.html

The interview is really detailed and shares a lot of information about the current film project to make a full length feature documentary about a group of girls in Villa 31 shantytown who dare to play soccer, which is considered a boy’s sport in Argentina.

The article allows the reader a real insight into the reasons behind San Telmo Production’s desire to create and film, “Goals for Girls: The Movie” and Ginger’s experiences as an expat in Argentina. For more than 8 years she has lived, worked, married and started a business in Buenos Aires. Her advice to fellow expats: Don’t expect to replicate your life in the US abroad. . . While I do these things because I love them, it has been easier for us to create projects than to get work on other people’s projects.

On top of the interview, there is a highly interactive Facebook Fan Page that you can join in order to show support for the project. Some of the project’s really supportive friends have been using the donate button on the Fan Page in order to donate small sums of money via Facebook too. These funds will be used to start a video workshop for the girls so they can contribute to the documentary.

The project, with their support of many, looks to be a real success and a positive lifeline for the girls from Villa 31.

Review of “Rompecabezas”, Argentine Winner of Berlin Film Festival

by Tracey Chandler, Contributing Blogger

“Rompecabezas,” (or jigsaw puzzle) starring Maria Onetto, Gabriel Goity and Arturo Goetz, is written and directed by Natalia Smirnoff and is yet another example of excellent Argentine film-making. Winner of the 2010 , the film is, quite simply, beautiful. The way in which the camera is operated from the very beginning helps to create a feeling of intimacy and the sound of the roasted chicken in the opening scene being split into wings, legs and breasts, creates a real sense of closeness between the audience and the characters; it builds tension and intrigue as well as familiarity and understanding at the same time. Indeed, the film’s signature theme tune is at the same time comic or playful, but slightly odd…slightly eerie.

The story centers on a middle-aged Argentine wife and mother, Maria, who begins to develop a fixation for completing jigsaw puzzles. She finds a jigsaw-puzzling partner, spends two afternoons every week practicing with him in secret, enters a competition and wins. However, the subtexts, subplots and significance of the jigsaw puzzle metaphor in general make the film so much more than what the simple narrative appears to let on to on the surface.

There are lots of moments of pure genius throughout regarding the script and the characterization too. The husband, for example, is particularly entertaining in terms of not really understanding how anyone can become so infatuated with jigsaw puzzles. Without a doubt, the director takes full advantage of the use of dramatic pause, complete with long, still camera shots full to the face to accentuate his bewilderment and thus heighten the comedy even further. However, beneath the humor of his character and his response to his wife’s new found venture, is also a deeply vulnerable and sensitive man who notices the differences in his wife’s behavior and fears that she is slowly pulling herself away from him, the family and everything that he knows. Indeed, the levels present in the characters are one of the best things about the film and is what gives it its truth.

Coming Soon: Eva & Lola

I just saw this trailer featuring two beautiful young actresses, Emme and Celeste Cid (Ms. Cid is a very famous television actress, and I think every man in Argentina has a crush on her) in a movie about an underground cabaret. . . The photography is excellent!

Eva’s father disappeared during the military dictatorship. Eva learns that the father of her friend Lola, working with the circus Punk Cabaret, also disappeared and when she was a child, Lola was raised by strangers. Eva helps her friend for her to choose between living a lie or seek the truth. It is based on a true story.

The Argentine premier is set for May 13 2010 and it is directed by Sabrina Farji.

The director hopes that this film will bring the story of the dictatorship to a younger audience by telling it in a fresh way.