Saturday, 18 September 2021 18:47

Tony Manero






TONY MANERO

Chile, 2008, 97 minutes, Colour.
Alfredo Castro.
Directed by Pablo Larrain.

A disturbing and challenging film from Chile.

Yes, the title is the name of John Travolta's character, the lithe disco dancer, in Saturday Night Fever. This film opens, in 1978, with a TV competition for lookalikes. Raul (an eerily mundane as well as sinister performance by Alfredo Castro), the central character, elicits our sympathy when he turns up on the wrong day for the Tony Manero competition (it is Chuck Norris day). Rather weather-beaten, 52 and a dancer and a choreographer in a small restaurant in the suburbs of Santiago, he seems a small-time loser. Just when we are sorry for him, he does something so despicable that we are shocked. And, without conscience, he keeps committing despicable acts, a self-centred man who cares little for the small dance troupe who are doing their best and for the woman who lets him stay on in the restaurant she runs.

Were that all there was to Tony Manero (and Raul's going to see the movie but one day finding, to his disgust, that Grease is screening (starring 'the same gentleman', as the lady at the ticket box advises him), then it would be a parable about the cult of celebrities, aping them and aspiring to really be them, clothes, appearance, manner...

But, in 1978, five years after the overthrow of Allende, General Pinochet rules Chile. There is a frightening military presence in the streets – and they are not slow to exercise authority and brutality. There is a curfew. There are informants on dissidents and interrogations with threats of torture.

Raul can be seen as a petty despot in his area, with seemingly no conscience and no compunction, an allegory of authority in Chile and of the ruthless Pinochet himself. The other criticism that the director says he wanted to make was of the loss of local culture and a slavish following of overseas popular cul and trends – with a climax, after Raul has ruined his troupe's young dancer's chance to compete as Tony Manero by showing himself as a literal shit, in a Pop Idol like TV glitz show with six Tony Manero's all trying to be John Travolta.

Not an easy film, with blunt sex and with even blunter brutality. But, small-budget, made on 16 mm and looking like it, with handheld camera, a type of guerilla film-making, it is still a very good film.

1.A disturbing film? As a drama, its themes?

2.Basic film-making and production, sixteen-millimetre photography, handheld camera, realistic, grainy, authentic? The feel and the mood? The Santiago streets? Colour?

3.1978, Chile, its history, the coup against Allende, the rule of General Pinochet (and seeing Pinochet in other films as well as films about the oppression and killings in Chile)? The military, their patrolling the streets, the curfew, the people disappearing, dissenters, publication of leaflets, arrests, interrogations, torture, killings in the street? Ruthlessness and an atmosphere of fear?

4.The title, the character in Saturday Night Fever? The character, what he stood for? John Travolta as an icon, dancing, his moves, the disco atmosphere?

5.The theme of celebrity? The Chuck Norris lookalike competition? The Tony Manero competition? Television, the tapings, the numbers of men lining up for the impersonations? The Tony Manero suit, hair, style? Raul as wanting to be Tony Manero – even to the black briefs in his room? The look, the swagger, the dance, the moves? The aim to be the celebrity? The cult of the celebrity, as an icon, worshipped? The consequences?

6.Audience sympathy for Raul initially, joining the queue, his friend at the studio not acknowledging him, his going on the wrong week? His disappointment, going for the interview, the form, his occupation, age, address, his being very ordinary, at home, alone?

7.Seeing the thugs in the street, the old woman with her shopping? Going to help, escorting her home, her offering food, watching television, her comments about General Pinochet’s eyes? The shocking and sudden brutality of his killing her? Taking the television? Audience shock at his heartlessness? His going home, hiding with the TV from people in the street?

8.Raul at the restaurant, Wilma owning the business, her clientele, trying to build it up? Her liking Raul but exasperated by him? Cony and her attraction to Raul, the dancing, the sexual compatibility? Her daughter Pauli, age? Goyo and his skill in dancing, ambitions? His dissenting activities, the dangers, the posters? The rehearsals, their energy, their hopes? Raul and his choreography, Cony and Raul marginalising the others?

9.Goyo and Raul following him, the leaflets, his contact, the military, shooting the man with the leaflets, Raul scavenging his body and taking his watch and possessions?

10.The floor for the restaurant, the glass bricks, going to imitate Saturday Night Fever, the difficulties with the money, going to collect them, Goyo helping him, killing the man?

11.Going to see the film, his going to see Grease and his disappointment, the wrong film, killing the projectionist, the shock of the box office lady?

12.Pauli, the rehearsals, the sexual liaison with Raul, its bluntness and brutality? Cony’s reaction? Goyo? The joyless sex, the physicality?

13.Raul and his plan for the competition? Goyo also going? His destroying Goyo’s suit with the excrement?

14.The police, the interrogations, Wilma, Goyo, Pauli, her mother informing? Raul hiding and thought absent from the restaurant?

15.Raul, going to the studio, the group of competitors, their personalities, the applause, the audience, the final, Raul losing, the winner and his wife, Raul following them in the bus?

16.The open ending – and what Raul would do?

17.The parallel with General Pinochet, as a celebrity, lack of morals, the nominal Catholic background, the crucifix? Ruthlessness, killing ordinary people without compunction, psychotic?

18.The issue of culture, Chile’s past, the internationalisation symbolised by the movies, Saturday Night Fever? Television and globalisation?
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