Broken Flag (1979)

Murder, ethics and exploitation

During the quarantine I have seen a lot of foreign cinema, and very little Mexican, which I want to amend. Of the three great contemporaries, Cuarón, Del Toro and Iñarritú, I have seen everything or almost everything, so let's diversify.

There are three Retes films that I really liked at the time, each one with its limitations: El Bulto , Bienvenido/ Welcome and A sweet scent of death .

This one in particular shows two of his personal obsessions: cinema about cinema, with a group of independent filmmakers at the center of the story, and casting his relatives, this time both his father and mother.

Here the central performance of two greats stands out: Manolo Fábregas and Aarón Hernán. A smile comes to my mouth when I see the beginnings of Tina Romero and Paloma Woolrich.

And 40 years later, my Mexico with the same problems: one law for the rich and another for the rest; violence against women; saving face more important than justice; and incidentally, the budget problems to do anything in cinema.

Hernán's physical resemblance to then-president, José López Portillo, does not go unnoticed. The production design marks a radical difference between the impoverished filmmakers and the powerful ones surrounded by porcelain, sculptures and baroque details, even in the smallest piece of furniture.

The last act, definitely falls into classic seventies exploitation, with blood, violence and nudity, to generate empathy for the characters, but also so that the public goes home scandalized.