Evita (1996)

Evita poster.jpg



The Secret in Their Eyes (2009)

The Secret in Their Eyes 2009 poster.jpg

This Argentinian film has recently been remade in the US with a starry cast and a re-triangulation of the original relationships. A retired prosecutor takes up his pen to write a novel and revisits a cold case from 25 years earlier which has stuck in his mind. We are brought back to the murder of a young school teacher, the eventual arrest of her rapist/killer, his release, and a lot of guilt at his supposed freedom.The prosecutor has always loved his co-worker who married someone else. He is still obsessed with how people look in photographs and wants to try to solve the case after all this time as it might help him write his book. The subtext is ‘the new Argentina’ as his boss has it, which justifies the killer’s release on the basis of his cooperation with the authorities. Remember what the Argentines used to do? Disappear people? Torture hundreds of thousands of their own citizens then … radically rewrite the census. (Can you imagine the fear on the Falklands as to what they might do to THEM? Luckily the Brits intervened to prevent 3,000 murders.) There is a twist but it seems superficial given the political arena which was called upon to amplify the ‘significance’ of the story. This has a lot less to it than meets the eye, as it happens. And I still want to see the remake.