Cinema
La sangre y la semilla
Alberto Du Bois · 1959
Synopsis
1870, at the end of the War of the Triple Alliance, during the exodus of the last loyalists of Marshal Francisco Solano López towards Cerro Corá. The widow of a Paraguayan officer, who is expecting a child, takes in a wounded sergeant who had been her husband's comrade in arms; she nurses him back to health. Both must hide from the Argentine army occupying the country, and have only one hope left, to keep fighting for Paraguay.
Context
The screenplay is by Augusto Roa Bastos, then in exile in Buenos Aires, based on an unpublished novel by Mario Halley Mora. The exteriors were shot in Paraguay, at Itauguá and Capiatá, the interiors in a studio in Buenos Aires; the Guarani dialogue is subtitled on screen. It was released on 12 November 1959, in both Asunción and Buenos Aires. It is the first film to deal with this war, and an Argentine-Paraguayan co-production whose enemy is the Argentine army. A restored print appeared in 2019, with a text by Hugo Gamarra Etcheverry.
Who it is for
In black and white, in Spanish and Guarani. It helps to know that the war ended at Cerro Corá on 1 March 1870, with the death of the Paraguayan head of state.
Prizes and reception
The first film devoted to the great conflict of 1864–1870; critics at the time praised the visual quality of the exodus scenes.