Print
E-Mail
tool name
closeWednesday, Oct. 28, 2009
'Tony Manero' not for the fainthearted
LORBER FILMS
LIFE OF LEISURE: Alfredo Castro in Tony Manero LORBER FILMS
Tony Manero
****
R (strong language, violence, graphic sex); 97 min.
In Tony Manero,an aging dancer living in Augusto Pinochet’s Chile dares to dream big.
Raúl Peralta (Alfredo Castro) longs to dress and dance and talk just like John Travolta’s Saturday Night Fever character, an icon of charisma whom Peralta studies religiously at the local cinema.
But Peralta, played with a dark and relentless creepiness by Castro, is no Borat, a naif who blindly imitates Western pop culture.
He’s a despicable human being. When he’s not practicing his electric slide (which is performed in precise and awful movements), he’s a thief, an adulterer, a murderer.
Yet he’s also, somehow, a leader who rules with fear — a Pinochet among his inner circle of tramps and dancers.
Director Pablo Larrain shoots Tony Manero with a hand-held camera and a ruthless lens: The streets of Santiago are lifeless; the characters are soulless; the existence grim.
Under these circumstances, one white leisure suit never represented so much hope and beauty, even if the man who wears it is pure darkness.
In Spanish with English subtitles.
Exclusive: Angelika Dallas
— Justin Berton, San Francisco Chronicle
DFW.com is pleased to be able to offer its users the opportunity to make comments and hold conversations online. However, the interactive nature of the internet makes it impractical for our staff to monitor each and every posting.
Since DFW.com does not control user submitted statements, we cannot promise that readers will not occasionally find offensive or inaccurate comments posted on our website. In addition, we remind anyone interested in making an online comment that responsibility for statements posted lies with the person submitting the comment, not DFW.com.
If you find a comment offensive, clicking the exclamation icon will flag the comment for review by the administrators; we are counting on the good judgment of all our readers to help us.
