TANGO FILM | The Argentine Tango at the cinema

A special selection of the best tango books to learn about the world of Argentine Tango

An interesting selection of books on tango in Italian, essays, manuals, guides and novels, which reveal all the secrets of a culture dedicated to Tango dance, music and poetry, telling the story of Tango from its origins to its contemporary evolutions.

The Tango Lesson  A Sally Potter tango film. With Sally Potter, Pablo Veron, Carolina Iatti, Gustavo Naveira. Original title The Tango Lesson. Comedy. Duration 102 min. Great Britain 1997. After the success of Orlando, Potter fell in love first with Astor Piazzolla and his music, then with tango as a dance and the pleasure of learning tango it and finally with Veron, a professional dancer who taught her. From this progressive life experience he made an exhibitionist film, shameless, self-satisfied, unequal, courageous and unusual: after practicing dance, choreography, singing, music, theater, he learned to dance the tango and was able to film with functional elegance this ambiguous, fast, close, melancholic and ecstatic dance.

Un Tango Mas A Tango film di German Kral con Maria Nieves Rego, Juan Carlos Copes, Pablo Veron, Alejandra Gutty, Ayelen Alvarez Miño, Juan Malizia. 2015 Life and love story of the famous Argentine tango dancers, María Nieves Rego and Juan Carlos Copes, who met in their teens and danced together for almost fifty years, until a painful situation separated them.

	Scent of a Woman Un tango Film di Martin Brest con Al Pacino, Chris O'Donnell, Gabrielle Anwar, Richard Venture, Philip Seymour Hoffman & Rochelle Oliver (1992) Charlie Simms managed to go to an elite college in Baird, lived in Boston. To earn some dollars, the young man agrees to have company for a weekend with Frank Slade, an elderly colonel, whose niece, with husband and children, wants to spend Thanksgiving elsewhere. First, Charlie joined a friend, George Willis Jr., who witnessed the preparation of a president-commanded joke, which comes right away with a colored liquid. He presides over an investigation prepared by the testimonial and the names of the culprits: otherwise Charlie will lose Harward's office. As much as George, nothing can happen to him, because his father is one of the sponsors of the School. Meanwhile, I approached the colonel for the first time. They are difficult: Slade is blind, grumpy, drunkard and aggressive, he speaks only of military service and discipline. In addition, the relatives leave, he decides to have fun
	Take the Lead Un tango film di Liz Friedlander con antonio banderas, Rob Brown, Yaya da Costa, alfre Woodard e John Ortiz (2006) a Manhattan dance teacher walking the streets, impeccably dressed, on his bicycle. One day he sees a student attacking a teacher's car with a golf club. Rock has its reasons, but it doesn't matter; Instead of calling the police, Dulaine walks into the school the next day and announces to the principal that he wants to teach ballroom dance to the detention class.

Tango A tango film by Carlos Saura. With Miguel Angel, My Maestro, Cecilia Nerova. Musical. Duration 115 min. Spain 1998. Abandoned by his beloved Laura (Narova), director Mario Suarez (Solá) tries to overcome the crisis by devoting himself to the staging of a tango musical on the recent history of Argentina. Nail drives nail: he falls in love with a young dancer (Maestro) who has the talent and charisma of a star, recommended to him by a powerful and shady producer. After the flamenco, the tango. Festival of commonplaces at a narrative level with the aggravating circumstance of the socio-political commitment, the film counts for the choreography, the skill of the actors-dancers, the figurative side. Saura believed he was using the mastery of Vittorio Storaro, the magician of lights, but it was Storaro who used him to make his own film, experimenting with the lighting possibilities of chiaroscuro and shadow.

Assassination Tango A Tango film di Robert Duvall. Con Robert Duvall, Rubén Blades, Kathy Baker, James Keane. Thriller. Durata 114 min. USA, Argentina 2002. John J. Anderson, an exponent of the New York underworld now on the path of decline, is hired to carry out a murder. The intended victim is an old Argentine army general who has committed horrific crimes against his people in the past. Once in Buenos Aires things get complicated, starting with the fact that the general due to a small accident. This hitch inevitably extends his stay in Argentina. After a meeting with the local accomplices X runs into two tango dancers almost by chance and is fascinated by them. He starts attending a milonga and takes tango lessons from a young woman who introduces him to the environment. A tango never ends with a random step: this cannot be said of the film, which instead ends with a fall (of tone). He's sorry, because the actor and director Duvall is still effective. However, he should have the scripts he writes revised more thoroughly.

Tangos - L'esilio di Gardel Titolo originale: Tangos - El exilio de Gardel. Un film di Fernando Ezequiel Solanas. Con Philippe Léotard, Marie Laforêt, Miguel Angel Sola. Drammatico. Durata 120 min. Francia, Argentina 1985. Argentina and France, is a film about exile as a sad carnival, absence, loss, nostalgia for a return. In critical and dialectical ways he questions the rights of man, the problems and contradictions of cultural integration, the relations between Argentines and Paris, the capital of culture and of all exiles. Made for a third of its duration of musical numbers, it is a tango anthology: about twenty extraordinary dancers, the great orchestra of Osvaldo Pugliese, the original music of Astor Piazzolla, old and new songs, and the voice of Carlos Gardel, dear to Argentines living abroad and to those exiled to their homeland. Jury Prize in Venice 1985.

Si Sos Brujo: Una historia de tango A Tango film di Caroline Neal. Documentario. Durata 79 min. - Argentina 2005. L'orquesta EL ARRANQUE, Ramiro Gallo's Quintet. Ignacio intends to create a Tango school and for this he launches himself in the reconquest of those great masters still alive. Each one is a treasure trove of secrets, anecdotes, life… A small film, a docufiction, a must for tango lovers.

	Cafè de Los Maestros A Tango film di Miguel Kohan. Con Aníbal Arias, Ernesto Baffa, Emilio Balcarce, Oscar Berlingieri, Gabriel Chula Clausi, Juan D'Arienzo, Jorge 'El Portugués' da Silva, Emilio De La Peña, Ubaldo De Lío, Carlos Di Sarli, Leopoldo Federico, Oscar Ferrari, Carlos García, Juan Carlos Godoy, Carlos Lázzari. Documentario. USA 2008. An interview with Argentine musicians and singers of the golden age of tango.
	Tango Bar Un film sul tango di Marcos Zurinaga. Con Raul Julia, Valeria Lynch, Ruben Juarez. Musicale. Durata 90 min. Spagna 1989. Un uomo giunto in Argentina dopo dieci anni di volontario esilio incontra la vecchia fiamma e un caro amico. Con questa esile trama il film ha modo di proporre la storia e l'evoluzione del tango grazie anche a spezzoni di repertorio e celebri brani musicali. La Lynch e Juarez sono tra i cantanti più noti in America Latina.
	Milonga Un film sul tango di Emidio Greco. Con Giancarlo Giannini, Claudia Pandolfi, Carlo Cecchi, Irene Ferri, Gianni Sperti, Urbano Barberini, Vanessa Gravina, Giuseppe Apolloni, Eleonora Mazzoni, Zeremariam Benini, Massimo Molea. Drammatico. Durata 98 min. - Italia 1999. Un noto conduttore televisivo è assassinato a colpi di pistola in pieno giorno nel centro di Roma. È il secondo omicidio di cui rimane vittima una personalità dello spettacolo. Svolge le indagini un commissario gay, assistito da una poliziotta, silenziosamente di lui innamorata. La soluzione arriva in una sequenza finale senza dialoghi di 9 minuti, lunga parentesi coreografica sul tango e sulla milonga che ne fu in Argentina la diretta precorritrice. Giannini si ritaglia il suo commissario leggermente isterico con un istrionismo ben temperato e si guadagna il Globo d'oro 1999.
	Ad occhi chiusi A Tango film sul tango e chi lo ama A film made to make those who don't dance understand what this dance, this magical culture can give. The film is also an opportunity to tell personal stories, reflect on the complex dynamics between man and woman and understand why fans around the world fight the tendency to individualism with tango steps.