"[16], A few critics were dismissive of the story Puenzo tells. [12], The film was entirely shot in the city of Buenos Aires, including the Plaza de Mayo where the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo congregated in the late 1970s with signs and pictures of desaparecidos who were subjected to forced disappearance by the Argentine military in the Dirty War. The Academy Award-winning debut from director Luis Puenzo is a powerful story of an adopted child, a returning political prisoner, and a deep reckoning with the past. Ana confronts him and accuses him of denouncing her and causing her arrest. The film is based on the real political events that took place in Argentina after Jorge Rafael Videla's reactionary military junta assumed power on March 24, 1976. While seeking Gaby's hospital birth records, Alicia learns of an organization searching for missing children. Roberto faces stress at work due to the machinations of his colleagues, several of whom disappear over the course of the film. This is the story of a middle class Latin American family that becomes involved in a search for their adopted daughter's missing parents. The Official Story (1985) cast and crew credits, including actors, actresses, directors, writers and more. Alicia's views are challenged by a fellow teacher, Benítez (Patricio Contreras), and some of her students. Alicia brings Sara home to meet Roberto, and he becomes furious.

The 1986 US VHS release by Pacific Arts video was a 4:3 cropped TV print with burnt-in English subtitles, but fully uncut with original Spanish audio in mono. This master was reused for the 1999 Fox Lorber DVD and VHS release. Unlike the 2003 Koch Lorber and Umbrella DVDs, the 2011 Arrow DVD is inferior to them due to utilizing a NTSC-PAL converted 4:3 letterbox presentation of the Almi Pictures US theatrical print with burnt-in English subtitles. Alicia Maquet, a high school history teacher, and her husband, Roberto Ibañez, a government official, live in Buenos Aires with their adopted daughter, Gaby, 5. [3][4][5], Among several other international awards, it won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film at the 58th Academy Awards.[6]. In 2018, Cohen Media Group picked up US video and digital rights to the 2015 4K restoration, with a remastered DVD and Blu-ray release commencing in October. They write, "The Official Story is a wrenching and painful drama that crystallizes the horror and the obscenity of political activities that annihilate family solidarity in the name of ideology...The Official Story packs a shattering visceral punch. "[9], The Official Story can be considered alongside a group of other films that were the first to be made in Argentina after the downfall in 1983 of the last Argentine dictator, Gen. Leopoldo Galtieri, and his autocratic regime. She returned after the fall of the military government in 1983. An Argentine teacher lives in blissful ignorance of the evils perpetrated by her country's government. Some of the key moments in the film come as we watch Aleandro and realize what must be taking place inside her mind, and inside her conscience.

Cannes Film Festival: Golden Palm, Luis Puenzo; 1985. [8] Aleandro once said, "Alicia's personal search is also my nation's search for the truth about our history. The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo continue to protest every Thursday afternoon at 3:30 pm in the Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires.[13].

Alicia asks why they celebrate the day they brought her home rather than the day she was born, and whether or not Roberto actually met Gaby's mother.

When Alicia reports the student, Benítez intervenes to protect him. She meets Sara, whose pregnant daughter was kidnapped by the armed forces, and believes Gaby may be her granddaughter. Academy Award Nominations: Best (Original) Screenplay. While Gaby sings "En El País de Nomeacuerdo" (In The Country of Idonotremember), a nursery rhyme, to Roberto, Alicia gets her purse and walks out the door, leaving her keys behind. The film is set in Argentina in 1983, in the last year of the country's last military dictatorship, during which a campaign of state-sponsored terrorism produced thousands of killings and torture of accused political leftists and innocents alike, who were buried in unmarked graves or became desaparecidos. But the junta government fell right about the time the screenplay was completed. Roberto insists it was a normal adoption. In May 2018, this 4K restoration made a US screening at the Cannes Classics festival. Over time, however, her students' rejection of the "official" versions of their history leads her to question things herself. It is a movie that asks some very hard questions ... Alicia is played in the movie by Norma Aleandro, whose performance won the best actress award at this year's Cannes Film Festival. He also comes into friction with his liberal father and brother, who frown on his ties to the ruling conservative military elite and argue in favor of social justice. The further miracle is that this is the 39-year-old director's first feature film. [1][2], The film deals with the story of an upper middle class couple who lives in Buenos Aires with an illegally adopted child. These films deal frankly with the repression, the torture, and the disappearances during Argentina's Dirty War in the 1970s and early 1980s; they include Funny Dirty Little War (1983) and Night of the Pencils (1986). At first Alicia laughs as she tells of her apartment being ransacked by officials, but soon begins to sob as she describes being held captive, tortured and raped for having lived with a man labeled as a subversive, even though she hadn't seen him in two years.

Kansas City Film Critics Circle Awards: KCFCC Award Best Foreign Film; 1986. In 2015, the film received a 4K restoration performed by worldwide rights holder Historias Cinematograficas Cinemania, with funding by the Argentinian National Film Institute. A definitive statement on the South American political system. She traveled to Uruguay first and Spain later. It stars Norma Aleandro, Héctor Alterio, Chunchuna Villafañe and Hugo Arana. "[15], Film critics Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, of the website Spirituality and Practice, were painfully touched by the story they viewed. Suspecting that her adopted daughter may have been the child of a murdered political prisoner, she attempts to unearth the truth. Alicia increasingly wonders about Gaby's origins and Alicia asks questions about Gaby's birth, a topic her husband has told her to ignore. Use the HTML below. Additional cast: Chela Ruiz (Sara); Chunchuna Villafañe (Ana); Hugo Arana (Enrique); Patricio Contreras (Benitz); Guillermo Battaglia (José); María Luisa Robledo (Nata); Analía Castro (Gabi); Jorge Petraglia (Macci); Augusto Larreta (General); and Leal Rey (Father Ismael). [7], Like many progressive actors and others in the country, the lead actress in the film, Norma Aleandro, was forced into exile during this time. ), Blazing Saddles (30th Anniversary Special Ed. Costa continues to provoke his classmates, and one day Alicia arrives to see newspaper accounts of the desaparecidos taped to the blackboard. Title: The Official Story (1985) 7.7 /10. This master was also used for the region 0 NTSC format Australian DVD release by Umbrella Entertainment.

CONADEP, Nunca Más Report, Chapter II, Section One: Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards, Argentine Film Critics Association Awards, National Board of Review of Motion Pictures, List of submissions to the 58th Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film, List of Argentine submissions for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, Time to Stop Calling Argentina’s Last Dictatorship a “Dirty War”, "The 58th Academy Awards (1986) Nominees and Winners", Academy Award for Best International Feature Film, Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion, Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film, Toronto International Film Festival People's Choice Award, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Official_Story&oldid=978973488, Silver Condor Award for Best Film winners, Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award winners, Best Foreign Language Film Golden Globe winners, Films about Latin American military dictatorships, Articles with Spanish-language sources (es), Articles containing Spanish-language text, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. In 2011, the film had made its first-ever video debut in the UK by Arrow Video on DVD.

), The Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun (Blu-ray), The Girl at the Monceau Bakery / Suzanne's Career, A new featurette on the restoration of the film. It is a performance that will be hard to forget, particularly since so much of it is internal. In the United Kingdom, it was released as The Official Version. The violence is interrupted by a telephone call from Gaby.
Academy Awards: Best Foreign Language Film. During the junta's rule, the parliament was suspended; unions, political parties and provincial governments were banned; and, in what became known as the Dirty War, between 9,000 and 30,000 people deemed left-wing "subversives" disappeared from society. Alicia gradually becomes friendly with Benítez as her research brings her closer to the truth. [10][11], At first, director Puenzo, fearing for his safety, intended to shoot the film in secret, using hidden 16mm cameras.

Although she tells him that Gaby is at his mother's house, he becomes enraged and assaults her. For example, The Chicago Reader's Dave Kehr thought "Puenzo's methods are so crudely manipulative ... that the film quickly uses up the credit of its good intentions."[17].

It has also been featured at various film festivals including the Toronto Festival of Festivals, the Berlin International Film Festival, the Cannes Film Festival, and the Mar del Plata Film Festival. Ana, Alicia's longtime friend, returns from exile in Europe and explains why she never told Alicia she was leaving. A second group of films, which includes Verónico Cruz (1988) uses metaphor and hints at wider socio-political issues. The mother comes to realize that her daughter may be the child of a desaparecida, a victim of the forced disappearances that occurred during Argentina's last military dictatorship (1976–1983), which saw widespread human rights violations including many thousands of murders. The Official Story (Spanish: La historia oficial) is a 1985 Argentine drama historical film directed by Luis Puenzo and written by Puenzo and Aída Bortnik. That evening, Alicia surprises Roberto when she tells him that Gaby is not home, saying, "How does it feel not knowing where your child is?"

It was picked up by for US distribution by Almi Pictures with a wider 1986 theatrical release. Alicia, like other members of the Argentine upper class, is not aware of how much killing and suffering has gone on in the country, and naively believes only guilty people are arrested. Want to share IMDb's rating on your own site?

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It belongs on the list with films like Z, Missing and El Norte, which examine the human aspects of political unrest. It was almost as painful for me. During a discussion about the death of Argentinean founding father Mariano Moreno, one student, Costa, argues that the government-issued history textbooks are "written by murderers.".

But her investigation reveals levels of political corruption so abhorrent that the illusions of her past life are irrevocably shattered.