REFLECTING HISTORY

US PREMIERE

TRELEW

Argentina, 2004, 95 min., Spanish

Director: Mariana Arruti
Producer: Maria Pilotti
Script: Mariana Arruti
Cinematography: Javier Miquelez
Editing: Mariana Arruti, Miguel Schverdfinger
Music: Bernardo Baraj
Sound: Marcelo Baraj
Production company: Fundacion Alumbrar
Print Source:
Fundacion Alumbrar
Santiago del Estero
264-Piso 5
1075 Buenos Aires
Argentina
Tel.: +54 11 4383 5647
Fax: +54 11 4383 5647
e-mail: fundacionalumbrar@yahoo.com
www.filmtrelew.com.ar



Trelew

Narrated by eye-witnesses and survivors, Trelew re-counts the shocking story of the events leading up to one of Argentina’s darkest moments: the 1972 massacre of 18 political prisoners in a remote prison in Rawson located in the bare and vast Argentinean Patagonia. Told in grizzly detail by surviving detainees from imprisoned guerilla organizations, who opposed the military dictatorship that followed the overthrow of President Arturo Illia, this intense film transports viewers back to August 15th 1972 when 100 prisoners implemented an elaborate escape plan with the help of local townspeople. A small group of prisoners succeeded in commandeering a plane and flying to safety in Chile, while the rest were forced to surrender to the authorities. They were later returned to a military prison, where they were gunned down in cold blood. 35-years later filmmaker Mariana Arruti revisits this terrible tragedy, one that foreshadowed a military dictatorship marked by state terrorism, in this remarkable and eye-opening historical document.

Mariana Arruti was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1969. Anthropologist and documentary filmmaker. Bachelor of Anthropological Sciences. Lecturer at the University of Buenos Aires. She studied filmmaking at the Fundación Universidad del Cine.

Filmography:

Trelew (2004);
The Strike of the Loonies (2002);
Presos de Bragado, Los (1999);
The Prisoners of Bragado (1999).

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 4 AT 5:00 PM./FACETS CINEMATHEQUE

FRIDAY, APRIL 6 AT 3:00 PM./GALLERY THEATRE