| Tango
Carlos Saura Spain
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| When filming for Tango started in June 1997, Carlos Saura told the press that the story would be "simple, because musicals should be simple." Whether Saura is capable of making a "simple" film is doubtful, and Tango is anything but: as he says himself, "simple is a complex word". |  |
| The fifth Saura film to explore a musical theme
– Blood Wedding, Carmen and Flamenco are perhaps the most familiar titles
to foreign audiences – is an emotionally challenging take on Argentina's
national dance which shows tango to be more than just a greased-back hairdo,
a nice pair of legs and a frilly dress. Rather than present us with a beautifully-lensed
overview, a la Sevillanas or Flamenco, this time we go – using one man's
mid-life crisis as a vehicle – to the heart of what tango means, and the
film makes the brain cells tap as much as the feet. Every new film is an
adventure," Saura says. "Despite the baggage of experience, there is still
something to be learned.
Made over almost six months in Buenos Aires on a specially-constructed 1200 square metre set, with a budget of around $5m, the film avails itself of the expert aid of regular Saura collaborators Vittorio Storaro and Oscar-winning Argentinian composer Lalo Schifrin, who is responsible for some of the film's original tangos. The film, from Saura's point of view, emerged from a childhood love of the music. "Tango music is one of the most beautiful kinds of music ever made." He says, citing Stravinsky and Albeniz as composers who have written tangos: "the rhythms of tango lend themselves to continual development, which I hope you can see in the film." Mario Suarez (Miguel Angel Roca) is a 40-something tango artist enjoying a mid-life crisis with all the trimmings. His wife, Laura (Cecilia Narova) has left him, and he is using a stick to get around. Mario throws himself into work and moves to the outskirts of Buenos Aires, where he is preparing a film about tango. Most of the film is concerned with Mario's attempts to get the production up and running. While at a cabaret, he meets dodgy entrepreneur Angelo Larroca (Juan Luis Galiardo), who tells him that he is in love with would-be dancer Elena Flores (Mia Maestro). Larroca asks Mario to give her an audition. Mario falls for Elena, at great risk, given Larroca's dangerous reputation. The form of Tango – following the line of Carmen, rather than Flamenco, in the way it contextualizes the dance – shows how the rituals and rhythms of tango extend into the individual, social and political life of Argentina. Miguel Angel Sola is excellent as the weary, Mario, seeking to avoid emotional suffering by plunging himself into his work and ironically finding love through music and dance. Several of the dance sequences are presented as imagined through his troubled eyes, while the political angle is felt most strongly through the film's powerful final sequence, a metaphorical recreation of the arrival of the first immigrants in the Argentinian capital who end up laying down their suitcases and dancing. Saura is celebrating not only tango, but the resilience of the human spirit. Of which it is a part. On a less cerebral level, we have the daring, beautiful choreography and the actors/dancers – several of whom (Julio Bocca, Juan Carlos Copes) are household names in Argentina. 'It's a lovely film,' Saura says, 'and not just because I made it – visually, it's extremely beautiful". Much of this is down to Storaro's games with light, shadow and visual texture. "Originally, Vittorio wanted to shoot the film in situ," says the director. "But I wanted to extend the line of the earlier films." "She had to be very young and to dance terribly well," Saura said when defining, pre-shooting, what he wanted from his main actress. This is typical Saura understatement. If an ability to make male viewers fall instantly in love with you is any indication of star potential, then Maestro has it. The Spanish-born actress has an extraordinary screen presence. A Spaniard making a film about tango for Argentina is like opening a
computer store in Silicon Valley, but the film's reception there does not
worry the director. "So far, the reception has been positive. But you can't
include everybody tango fans might have wanted to see. You try to be respectful
of everyone's opinions, but in the end it comes down to my
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