Fernando Birri

In 1997 the Argentine filmmaker Fernando Birri returned to his home country to film a documentary on the 30th anniversary of the death of Che Guevara and the relevance of utopias at that time. Carmen Guarini decided to record those moments. A rough edit of this film was hidden away on a fragile VHS tape for twenty years. Today, these images come to life and shed some light on the life of this Latin American poet and master filmmaker, who, at the age of 92, still refused to give up on his own utopias.

Few people in Argentine and Latin American cinema have been as close as Fernando Birri to stand as a patriarch, pioneer, and spokesman for a committed cinema that tears itself apart in its solidarity with its own surroundings. This ode to the tireless Birri presents him to us in full: teaching, establishing standards, and creating with the tools of his time, turning culture into a form of political affirmation as he grows more and more vital and rooted.

A mockumentary about three young student filmmakers as they make a movie about an alleged film director living obscurely in a Buenos Aires mental hospital. In their visits to the mental hospital, the three students will forge a very special relationship with the self-styled former film director as they follow different clues and strategies to discover his 'true' identity.

Documentary film about Argentinian filmmaker Fernando Birri. An interview: a journey through documentary filmmaking, his childhood, the dawning of New Latin American cinema...

A version of El Estatola del Campo's poetic Faust of the Poet (1886) integrates the major trilogy of Argentine gaucho poetry, is proposed here in a faithful version and integral.

Documentary about the relationship between filmmaker Glauber Rocha and Cuba.

What does Che Guevara"s mythic presence represent to people at the turn of the century, and how do people define their concept of utopia?

Narrated [not only] with puppets, a dramatic vision of Latin America throughout the 20th century with its constant ferment of dictatorships, hunger, corruption, civil wars, heroic episodes and spilled blood.

Narrated [not only] with puppets, a dramatic vision of Latin America throughout the 20th century with its constant ferment of dictatorships, hunger, corruption, civil wars, heroic episodes and spilled blood.

Documentary that celebrates 100 years of cinema in Latin America and talks about the origins and the development of cinema in this subcontinent. Its structure is based in 12 short films directed by various Latin American directors. These are: 1) "Los inicios", Iván Trujillo 2) "Cuando comenzamos a hablar", María Novaro 3) "Jugando en serio", Jacobo Morales 4) "De cuerpo presente [Las espirales perpetuas del placer y el poder] Cine Mexicano [1931- 1997]", Marcela Fernández Violante 5) "Cuando quisimos ser adultos", Edmundo Aray and David Rodríguez 6) "Cinema Novo", Orlando Senna 7) "Memorias de una isla, Juan Carlos Tabío 8) "Un grito, 24 cuadros por segundo", Julio García-Espinosa 9) "El día de la independencia", Federico García 10) "¿Sólo las formas permanecen?", Fernando Birri and Pablo Rodríguez Gauregui 11) "Todo final es un principio", Andrés Marriquín.

An elderly man with wings is blown off course during a tropical storm in this symbolic fantasy. The Old Man lands near a Caribbean island where a poor family gives him shelter in a chicken coop. Father Gonzaga is the skeptical priest who rushes to damn the creature. Soon the Old Man is the subject of curiosity seekers as Elisinda and Pelayo start charging admission. A traveling carnival of human oddities camps near the Old Man as people flock to see the show. The Old Man is reduced to being an unwanted pet, and after six years, he mends his wings and flies away. Nudity, simulated sex with a spider woman, and the ugliness of human exploitation definitely put this fantasy in a category not for children.

An elderly man with wings is blown off course during a tropical storm in this symbolic fantasy. The Old Man lands near a Caribbean island where a poor family gives him shelter in a chicken coop. Father Gonzaga is the skeptical priest who rushes to damn the creature. Soon the Old Man is the subject of curiosity seekers as Elisinda and Pelayo start charging admission. A traveling carnival of human oddities camps near the Old Man as people flock to see the show. The Old Man is reduced to being an unwanted pet, and after six years, he mends his wings and flies away. Nudity, simulated sex with a spider woman, and the ugliness of human exploitation definitely put this fantasy in a category not for children.

An elderly man with wings is blown off course during a tropical storm in this symbolic fantasy. The Old Man lands near a Caribbean island where a poor family gives him shelter in a chicken coop. Father Gonzaga is the skeptical priest who rushes to damn the creature. Soon the Old Man is the subject of curiosity seekers as Elisinda and Pelayo start charging admission. A traveling carnival of human oddities camps near the Old Man as people flock to see the show. The Old Man is reduced to being an unwanted pet, and after six years, he mends his wings and flies away. Nudity, simulated sex with a spider woman, and the ugliness of human exploitation definitely put this fantasy in a category not for children.

Exiled Chilean director Patricio Guzmán filmed in Cuba and in Venezuela to create this controversial statement on the creation and survival of Latin American culture from the late-15th century to the present. For some viewers, the film will be superficially symbolic and rhetorical, for others, it will be a strong and personal vision of several centuries of history.

This documentary is a portrait made in Mexico by a group of Argentine exiles, directed by the painter Nicolás Amoroso.

This documentary is a portrait made in Mexico by a group of Argentine exiles, directed by the painter Nicolás Amoroso.

Explores the complex relationship between the spirit, body, and mind. The film is a nightmare with closed eyes because it counts among the most terrible moments of my life, my second exile, which lasted a very long time. Inspired by an ancient Hindu legend.

Explores the complex relationship between the spirit, body, and mind. The film is a nightmare with closed eyes because it counts among the most terrible moments of my life, my second exile, which lasted a very long time. Inspired by an ancient Hindu legend.

Equal parts philosophical treatise and artist’s portrait, this short follows the thoughts and methods of Argentine artist Juan Carlos Castagnino, whose commitment to utopian thinking and radicalism mirror Birri’s own. “Living up to date is living one day in advance”, says the painter, as Birri will go on to pair Castagnino with both the Beatles and Argentine folk songs, cluing one in to his notion of keeping ties to the cultural and the radical present. - Spectacle Theater

Documentary that describes the awakening of the city and its daily movement.

“My life was the same as that of thousands of gringos: I plowed and sowed the land, and went to the bar on Sunday.” Such is the refrain throughout LA PAMPA GRINGA, which endeavors to relate the sense of community built by the European settlers who in 1865 first colonized the town of Esperanza, located in Birri’s native province of Santa Fe. Largely consisting of juxtaposed daguerreotypes from the period and newspaper printings, LA PAMPA GRINGA exhibits Birri’s ability to weave narratives out of historical documentation in deft, admirable form.

“My life was the same as that of thousands of gringos: I plowed and sowed the land, and went to the bar on Sunday.” Such is the refrain throughout LA PAMPA GRINGA, which endeavors to relate the sense of community built by the European settlers who in 1865 first colonized the town of Esperanza, located in Birri’s native province of Santa Fe. Largely consisting of juxtaposed daguerreotypes from the period and newspaper printings, LA PAMPA GRINGA exhibits Birri’s ability to weave narratives out of historical documentation in deft, admirable form.

Tells the story of a poor family, inhabitants of the southern province of Santa Fe, who is forced to move into an abandoned railroad until waters recede Salado river wagon.

Tells the story of a poor family, inhabitants of the southern province of Santa Fe, who is forced to move into an abandoned railroad until waters recede Salado river wagon.

In 1956, the humorous designer Oski made a work about the foundation of the city of Buenos Aires. Fernando Birri made a film from this work in 1959, using the original text of the German explorer Ulrich Schmidel. This film, which disappeared in the years of the dictatorship, was miraculously restored on video in 2000. The story that the documentary describes can be compared with the situation of Latin American cinema throughout all these years.

Everyday the children of the neighborhood known as "Tire Dié", in the city of Santa Fe, wait for the train to ask for money, shouting "Tire dié!" (toss me a dime!) to the passengers. Considered the first survey-on-film in Latin America.

Everyday the children of the neighborhood known as "Tire Dié", in the city of Santa Fe, wait for the train to ask for money, shouting "Tire dié!" (toss me a dime!) to the passengers. Considered the first survey-on-film in Latin America.

A group of rich young intellectuals hiding from the war in rural Italy play at being partisans when some disbanded soldiers and some refugees ask them for shelter in their villa. The young and aristocratic Andrea strikes up a friendship with a peasant girl, Lucia. Then the Germans suddenly appear, looking for the real partisans, and the time comes for serious decisions.

Attila, the leader of the barbarian Huns and called by the Romans "The Scourge of God", sweeps onto the Italian peninsula, defeating all of the armies of Rome, until he and his men reach the gates of the city itself.

A young boy, about to take his first communion, must wrestle with his familial loyalty and his conscience when there is a fire at their local cinema where his brother works and it is clear that he is involved in the theft of the projector. Determined to right the wrong done by his sibling, he attempts to make amends.

The Cheerful Squadron is a 1954 Italian war-comedy film directed by Paolo Moffa and Interpreted by movie stars like Paolo Stoppa, Vittorio De Sica, Alberto Sordi and Silvana Pampanini. Based on the military environment novel The Allegro Squadron by Georges Courteline (1886), this film presents a series of sketches on military life in the late nineteenth century.

Short documentary drawing parallels between the Sicilian people and their history of profane visual representation.

Short documentary drawing parallels between the Sicilian people and their history of sacred visual representation.

SELINUNTE marks Birri’s first cinematic effort, made during his years studying at the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia di Roma.