“Goodbye to Lilas” with Jorge Marrale: when independent cinema is hit with real life

“Goodbye to the Lilas” had its premiere in April at the Buenos Aires Festival of Buenos Aires (Bafici) and now reached the country’s rooms. The film directed and starring Cordoba Hugo Curletto challenges the limits of metafiction, the genre that explores the cinema itself. The director decides to open the doors of his life and proposes to make a film about a trip to Las Vegas that, long ago, did with his father and brothers. A journey that ended in a tragedy in the Grand Canyon of Colorado.

In this story, Hugo Curletto is self -authored as Dany Summer because, although he exposes his intimacy and even his relatives appear, he also decides to play with himself. “It is not from a narcissistic point of view, but I inquire into me because in one is human nature”explained the director in dialogue with Scope.

Dany Summer with her producer (Jasmine Sequeira) manages to get the emblematic actor Jorge Marrale to play “Chif”, the father of this story. Yes, for the first time Marrale acts as Marrale. “I cares about how Jorge Marrale is, I ran from that place and set out to play,” said the actor.

If reality is fiction, can you escape from it? Dany Summer reveals all the details of the trip to Las Vegas. However, for Jorge Marrale it is not enough, since to interpret “Chif”, a ludopath merchant, he needs to understand the reason for all his decisions. “Goodbye to Lilas” evidences that, in the cinema, as in life, not everything has an explanation. The only thing to do is accept it.

“Goodbye to Lilas”: direct life

“I was going to play with that impunity my old man had. A ‘Chif’ was not going to demand things or ask him to study a scene,” said Hugo Curletto, who decided to maintain a genuine tone, especially with his intimacy. For scripts, there are movies. “The idea was to run from this thing to sacralize family memory and make it enter a more playful game from that pact with fiction,” added the director. His three brothers, his wife and children lend themselves to this work. Dany Summer’s world crosses Hugo Curletto.

The director not only opens the doors of his house, but also of his memories. Almost as if it were a documentary, use homemade videos of the trip to Las Vegas. Will you have known from that moment what would be the end of the recordings?

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Jorge Marrale plays “Chif”, the director’s father.

Release in times of uncertainty for cinema

“This is a film that is a metaphor of how cinema is made today in Argentina. In general, the cinema that needs importance, support and promotion is paralyzed,” said Jorge Marralewho is part of the Board of Directors of the Argentine Society for the Management of Interpreters (Sagai).

The film received support from different entities from Córdoba, including the Audiovisual Pole, the Municipality of Córdoba and Río Cuarto. These stories are going through the interior of the country, then, those who have the tools, help foster cinematographic activity. The director remarks that, although it is not necessarily filmed in the provinces, the context relievedly changed because the National Institute of Cinema and Audiovisual Arts (INCAA), which was a decisive factor in production, today cut its expenses and released the hand to Argentine cinema.

“Goodbye to Lilas” is an independent film within another. “Marrale means Bafici, Cosquín Rock,” the producer tells Dany Summer in a scene where they analyze the possibilities that may arise if the emblematic actor stars in his film. With irony the story exposes the “side B” of filming and producing in the country. From the complications that can arise to the sacrifices to be done.

“Today, brand new Argentine cinema is an emblem, a flag that is getting up in front of the ‘no’,” said Jorge Marrale. After passing through the Bafici and having its premiere in Río Cuarto, Córdoba, “Goodbye to Lilas” already reached the cinemas of the country.