Invasión

Jorge Luis Borges was a great writer. Adolfo Bioy Casares was a good writer with infrequent flashes of very good. Occasionally, they wrote together. Curiously, the quality of their joint work always sank lower than the quality of each writer's output; they seemed to cause each other to lower their standards. The story for this movie is an example. It narrates the resistance of a small group against an invasion and takeover of an imaginary country in an abstract, bloodless and totally unrealistic fashion. The dialog has been written by Borges and the director Hugo Santiago. The lines are frequently stilted and literary; a great writer is not necessarily a good screenwriter. The actor's delivery of the dialog tends to the monotonic. The direction is uneven; the movie proceeds briskly at times, but it has very slow stretches. Action scenes are not very believable.

What makes this film watchable is the extraordinary black and white cinematography by Ricardo Aronovich; in spite of its virtuosity it never interferes with the action. After a brilliant career in Argentina Aronovich moved to Europe where he became one of the best cinematographers in the world.

The subject of this film (and some scenes) caught the attention of the military dictatorship that took power in Argentina in 1976. Parts of the original negative were destroyed. The version we watch now is made from the surviving negative and positive copies.

We're in Aquileia, Argentina in 1957 for this most unusual drama. It's dark, tense, moody and black and white of course. Very cloak and dagger. Quite subjective. A shipment has arrived at the port, border guards are shot as its smuggled into the city on a truck. Don Porfirio (Juan Carlos Paz) makes a phone call. Herrera (Lautaro Murúa) has a pocket full of bullets. Irene (Olga Zubarry) picks up a mysterious package. Everyone is getting ready. They're awaiting an Invasion. Maybe it's the lack of colour, maybe the language I don't speak, maybe the henchmen in dark suites, but it's gripping stuff. Herrera is confident. A leader, full of cold stares and carefully chosen words. To be honest there's a lot of cold stares. Time is taken, very little rashness, this is serious... although I'm not quite clear what everyone is being serious about. Herrera gets accosted by a gang of men in light trench coats and before long, shots are fired and cars are chased with some lovely camera work. Herrera is supposed to intercept the truck, whilst Porfirio orchestrates things from his flock wallpapered apartment with his faithful black cat. It's a stylish thriller full of romantic swagger and venomous cool. Clearly shot silent, with added foley sound, it has a sparse energy to it which gets quite unnerving, but it adds nicely to the tension. There's a pretty large cast, but because of its thoughtful pace, it's easy to follow and appreciate. It's clear who the main players are. Like Irene and Herrera who seem to be an item, but also appear to be on opposite sides. Sides of a political feud, territory, sovereignty, I don't think it matters. It's all about the battle of two opposing parties, determined to undermine and defeat the other. Clearly one good clinging to freedom, one bad hellbent on control. We're only ever really shown one side, clear where our allegiances are intended to lie. So when Herrera finds himself interrogated by the other side, it makes what's already a fantastic scene all the more magnificent. It's remarkably easy to watch, despite being pretty brutal with a fair amount of bloodshed on both sides. The sound, although added, is marvellous. The cinematography, acting, edit are all outstanding. Not to mention the action, that as the film goes on, becomes relentless. Our cast dwindling, paying the price of their convictions, until Herrera finds himself faced with an inevitable reality. Tiny details aren't really important, it's the atmosphere created that makes this so good. Director Hugo Santiago seems to have an interesting story, fleeing Argentina to Paris in the aftermath of a coup that eerily took place a decade after Invasión. His filmography is sparse, but I'm inclined to dig deeper on the strength of this.

Hugo Santiago's 'Invasion' is a film about struggle: the endless struggle of a handful of men against totalitarianism. It illustrates the secret, sometimes vain battle for freedom by depicting a strong, dark and powerful masterpiece with heroic characters who defend their hometowns against mysterious invaders. However, the most striking aspect of the movie is the way it anticipates on History, indeed a decade after the movie was shot, Argentina was to fall in the hands of a cruel military regime. From the electric torture scenes to the stadium ( the very place originally used by the regime to execute the opponents ), everything is unfortunately at the right place. From the artistic point of view, Invasion is beyond reproach, directed by a disciple of Renoir and Antonioni. It really thrills the audience from the beginning to the end; the pace is perfect, action scenes are outstanding ( the overall strategy plan designed by the old man reminded me of Kurosawa's Seven Samourai - Aquilea eventually looks like the small Japanese village). The score is interesting too with eerie noises and a moving tango song whose lyrics are somewhat premonitory. Acting is also amazing, with their cold beauties the characters communicate their fears and hopes which contribute to the 'on the run' atmosphere of the movie. Still, Invasion is neither a documentary nor a propanganda, it is not a political movie either ( at least at first sight ) but it uses the political pattern to deliver a wider message : 'we have to fight but in secret and knowing the fight is endless' Afterall, Invasion is a metaphysical fable, some kind of an Illiade. Cold, pessimistic mysterious but superb, Invasion spawns a reflexion about life,

Highly ambitious and quite atmospheric, but otherwise, a failure. The decision to be 100% vague and ambiguous over pretty much everything which goes on ultimately did more harm than good for me as it prevented me from forming an emotional connection with anyone or anything and left me asking "Why should I care?" constantly. For instance, a character gets shot. We know nothing about that character or the politics/goals of the side they're fighting for, so why should I care about that? The entire first half involves the resistances efforts to steal a truck from the invaders, but we know nothing about what the invaders are planning on doing if they're successful with their goals or even if the resistance fighters are actually the good guys, so why should I care about that? Overall, I was just left emotionally cold and unimpressed by everything since I was given nobody and nothing to latch on to. The closest the film came to moving me were the brief discussions on how the resistance has to save the city, but even this was too vague to go all the way. And yes, I'm aware that giving an explanation to the motives of both sides likely wasn't what the filmmakers wanted to do, so I don't mean for this to be "They should've made the film I wanted them to make" criticism. The film is exactly what they wanted it to be and, considering it has plenty of fans, it seemed to pay off pretty well. I, personally, was unmoved by it though.

a day after i saw invasion (at tiff) i had already come to take it for granted as a part of the essential canon of 60's film. though the affinities with some new wave and related trends of the period (godard, antonioni, resnais) have been noted- and i would certainly add bunuel to that list- hugo santiago's film adds something decisively different to the mix, something you maybe always unconsciously felt belonged there but wasn't really represented by any particular film or "auteur". unfortunately the original negatives were seized (and presumably destroyed) by the military in the early 70's, and the restored print is variable in quality with shoddy french subtitles over which the English titles are projected in real time. this resulted in many mistakes which threatened to render the story even more mysterious than it was intended to be! someone badly needs to do a new restoration on this one! regardless, invasion is, especially when taken in context (1969!) a remarkable achievement in every way. superb, velvety black-and-white cinematography, fabulous location shooting, brilliant performances, and all that, combined with a meaningful, prescient story of the "inevitable, irresistible invasion" which was shortly to overtake argentina and subsequently all of us... the brutally inhuman men in suits...! the protagonist herrera (lautaro murua) is the quintessential borgesian knife-fighter reconfigured as a gun-toting ruthless thug defending civilization-as-we-know it from the "invaders"... the counter-revolution, as is made clear in the film, remains well below the the radar of the everyday football-obsessed citizen... superb, and more timely than ever!!!