The Walker Art Center’s ongoing series Premieres: First Look continues with the area premiere of Pablo Larrain’s
Tony Manero
, September 11–13 (Friday, September 11, 7:30 pm; Saturday, September 12, 4 and 7:30 pm; Sunday, September 13, 3 pm). In an intense film set against the backdrop of General Pinochet’s late 1970s brutal regime in Chile, Alfredo Castro plays Raúl Peralta, an aging sociopathic lowlife obsessed with Tony Manero, John Travolta’s character from Saturday Night Fever. The film is rife with plot twists, and Peralta’s bleak and darkly comic reality descends into an unrestrained world that mimics the totalitarian regime all around him; he will stop at nothing to become his idol. “Not many filmmakers could hope to successfully combine disco and political oppression, but Pablo Larrain does so. Funny, foul and compelling” (Film 4). Chile’s 2009 Academy Awards official submission. 2008, in Spanish with English subtitles, 35mm, 98 minutes.
Pablo Larrain was born in Chile in 1976. After studying film direction, he founded Fabula, a company devoted to audiovisual and communications development, where he produced and directed his first feature film, Fuga, which had its commercial release in 2006. Also that year, he produced La Vida Me Mata (Life Kills Me), directed by Sebastián Silva. Tony Manero is Larrain’s second film as director.
Tickets to Tony Manero are $8 ($6 Walker members) and are available at walkerart.org/tickets or by calling 612.375.7600. Screenings take place in the Walker Cinema.
