REVIEWS No Reviewed by Lee Marshall
TELLING STORIES
Talk about shooting oneself in the foot. The final part of Chilean director Pablo Larrain’s trilogy set against the back- drop of the Pinochet regime had the potential, on paper, to be the most commercially viable of the lot: a dream pitch, it stars Gael Garcia Bernal as a keen young Chilean ad man who is asked to come up with a campaign for the (ultimately successful) anti-Pinochet ‘No’ vote in the 1988 national plebiscite, which ended 16 years of military dictatorship. But Larrain’s bizarre decision to make his film blend in
with its extensive passages of archive footage by shooting in U-matic — the default TV production format of the 1980s — makes for an uncomfortable cinematic viewing experi- ence, and will seriously compromise the film’s sales pros- pects. We have moved on from those noisy reds, bleeding whites and colour halos, and Larrain’s misguided homage reminds us of just how ugly they were. For all these reasons, this is going to be a challenging film
to move and market. Distributors who do take the bait will no doubt embrace the look of the film in their marketing materials rather than trying to paper it over. A forewarned audience may react better to the ploy. At least they will not wonder if the projectionist is off on his coffee break. Gael is solid as René Saavedra, a young and upwardly
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mobile adman who is introduced pitching a TV cola ad to prospective clients. He lives alone with his young son, whose mother Veronica (Zegers) — now in another relationship — is a left-wing activist. She is scornful when René is engaged to help the campaign for a ‘No’ vote in a plebiscite against an eight-year extension of Pinochet’s regime — a referendum that international pressure has forced the ageing dictator to hold. The ‘No’ camp has been guaranteed just 15 minutes of late-night TV airtime to put their case; the regime gets all the rest. René forces his political clients to ditch downbeat mes-
sages about torture in favour of a happy-happy campaign with a rainbow symbol. When initial results are promising, the regime begins to use strongarm tactics, tailing and threatening the ‘No’ campaign team. Though there are some decent ironic moments and the
SELLING STORIES
late 1980s ambience is competently brought back to life in costumes and production design, the dramatic tension of the march towards the crucial vote keeps slipping as the film becomes bogged down in detail. It seems strange to say this to a director who has become a stalwart of the Latin Ameri- can arthouse scene, but this is one film where Larrain and his scriptwriter might have benefitted from making as a tighter US-style commercial product. It is clear that, deep down, this is what it would like to be.
DIRECTORS’ FORTNIGHT
Chile-US. 2011. 116mins Director Pablo Larrain Production companies Participant Media, Funny Balloons, Fabula International sales Funny Balloons, www.
funny-balloons.com Producers Juan de Dios Larrain, Daniel Marc Dreifuss Executive producers Jonathan King, JeffSkoll Screenplay Pedro Peirano, based on the play Referendum by Antonio Skarmeta CinematographySergio ArmstrongGonzalez Editor AndreaChignoli Production designer Estefania Larrain de la Cerda MusicCarlosCabezas Main castGaelGarcia Bernal, AlfredoCastro, Luis Gnecco, Antonia Zegers, MarcialTagle,Nestor Cantillana, Jaime Vadell, Pascal Montero
n 28 Screen International at Cannes May 19, 2012
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