Tony Manero (2008)

Directed by: Pablo Larrain | 98 minutes | drama | Actors: Alfredo Castro, Paola Lattus, Héctor Morales, Amparo Noguera, Elsa Poblete

Tony Manero was the name of the character John Travolta played in ‘Saturday Night Fever’, a role that definitely put him on the map in 1977. In ‘Tony Manero’, set in 1978 Chile during Pinochet’s violent regime, Raul is completely obsessed with this character. In his dream of winning a Chilean Tony Manero imitation contest, he goes over corpses. Literal. That first murder still hits like a sledgehammer, because it’s so unexpected. Raul sees from the window of his stuffy apartment that an old lady is being mistreated in the street and comes to the aid of the elderly person in pants. When he brings her home, however, it doesn’t take long before he smashes her skull in. Why? Because she told him that Pinochet has blue eyes? Probably because she has a color television, which Raul takes home cold-blooded under his arm.

At the beginning of the film, you still have some sympathy for the 52-year-old man when he shows up a week early at the studio where the talent contest is being filmed (it’s Chuck Norris week), but he soon loses this sympathy. . Raul is a horrible guy, who ruthlessly tries to achieve his goal, without taking into account the people in his environment, of which especially the female part falls for him in an incomprehensible way. Raul lives with his girlfriend Cony and her almost grown daughter Pauli, with whom he forms a dance group. Despite the fact that the man is as impotent as anything, and makes no secret of it, young Pauli likes him, which manifests itself in a bizarre and quite explicit sex scene (in a similar scene before we can already see how “cozy” Cony and Raul have it on the sexual front). Pauli’s young and ambitious boyfriend Goyo completes the dance group; led by Raul they try to evoke the ‘SNF’ feeling. Goyo’s ambitions run counter to Raul’s hair, resulting in a humorous scene when the young duo show Raul a new dance routine. “But that’s not in the movie!” is Raul’s indignant reaction. It is clear: Raul determines how it should be done and the only guideline is the film, which he repeatedly watches in a squalid cinema, while muttering the dialogues and imitating the moves of his hero. You can see it coming from the programming of ‘Saturday Night Fever’ (in favor of ‘Grease’) but this results in one of the most shocking scenes in the film.

‘Tony Manero’ is very macabre. It’s a difficult film to sit through, not only because the main character is the prototype of a nerd, the camera work also contributes to this. Sometimes scenes appear to have been shot intentionally out of focus, but this serves no purpose and is only a distraction. It comes across as quite pretentious and that’s a shame. The choppy image enhances the documentary feel, which means that the film gains in impact. What really draws the film to the plus side, however, is the excellent work of the cast, who are completely absorbed in the bizarre story. ‘Tony Manero’ is the second film by Pablo Lerrain, who previously canned ‘Fuga’. His second production, in which he subtly criticizes Chile’s political climate in the 1970s, certainly earned him a lot of publicity, the film impressed several international film festivals. However, the grim style and the pitch black humor (which you have to want to see) make it not recommended for a large audience. However, if you like separate stories and don’t shy away from some senseless violence and other gore events, then this film is definitely worth watching.