Feature film
The Life Jacket Is Under Your Seat
El Chevrolé
Leonardo Ricagni · 1999
Synopsis
Tuleque, a musician, gets out of prison after years. He wants to play again with his old group, the Chevrolés, whose members have scattered across Montevideo and earn their living through small trades; he sets off to find them one by one. The title comes from a real Chevrolet turned into a pedlar's van, which is seen in the main scenes. The search crosses the city during the festival days, from the beach where Iemanjá is celebrated to the drums of the carnival.
Context
The screenplay, by Pato López, Néstor Piñón and the director, adapts a play created in 1987 by Mauricio Rosencof, a former hostage of the dictatorship, released two years earlier after thirteen years in prison. Jorge Esmoris plays Tuleque, alongside Rubén Rada, Leo Maslíah and Hugo Fattoruso. The film is shot in Montevideo; its high point is set at the festival of Iemanjá, on Ramírez beach, and during the Llamadas, the parade of nearly a thousand drums in the Barrio Sur. The sound is reworked at Twickenham studios, in England. It is the first film of recent Uruguayan cinema to draw sixty thousand viewers.
Who it is for
A musical comedy in Spanish, an hour and a half long, carried by the musicians of Montevideo and the drums of carnival.
Prizes and reception
Nominated for best screenplay by the Argentine critics, awarded for its music at Tribeca and as best film at Houston; it opens the Latin American festival in London.
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