Adolfo Aristarain

Adolfo Aristarain (Parque Chas, Buenos Aires, October 19, 1943) is an Argentine film director and screenwriter. His career as a director is one of the longest and most outstanding in Argentine filmography. He has also been an assistant director on more than 30 films. His films combine the narrative strength of classic American cinema and the social themes of Argentine political cinema. In 2003 he was granted Spanish nationality by naturalization letter.

Biography

Since his childhood he has been a voracious reader and inveterate movie buff. He studied English until it became his second language. Regarding cinema and literature, he decided to be self-taught. He tried to be a storyteller in his teens and did a program on Radio Nacional, in which he read Dylan Thomas' own translations.

He had some approaches to cinema as an editor and sound engineer in Rio de Janeiro, and as a production assistant in Buenos Aires. Finally, in the early 1970s, he began to work systematically and professionally as an assistant director. In 1967 he settled in Madrid and returned to Buenos Aires in 1974. He continued learning the film trade working as an assistant until, after thirty feature films assisting directors such as Mario Camus, Vicente Aranda, Sergio Leone, Lewis Gilbert, Gordon Flemyng, Peter Collinson, Daniel Tinayre and Sergio Renán, wrote a script and managed to make his first film in 1978.

He carried out his work as a film director, producer and screenwriter between Argentina and Spain, and sporadically in the United States. He is a member of the Spanish Academy and was vice president of Argentine Film Directors (DAC) during the two years in which the current Film Law was promoted from that entity. In 2003 he was granted Spanish nationality by Royal Decree, in recognition of his contribution to Ibero-American culture.

Throughout his filmography there is a certain repetition in the casts, appearing on more than one occasion actors such as Juan Diego Botto, Cecilia Roth, José Sacristán and, most notably, Federico Luppi, who has often been called considered Aristarain's fetish actor, despite the fact that he has always denied it. In the 80's Aristarain stated that his teachers were John Ford, Howard Hawks, Raoul Walsh, Nicholas Ray and John Huston.

In various interviews, Aristarain has talked about his last three works, Martín (Hache), Lugares comúnes (based on the novel by his cousin Lorenzo F. Aristarain) and Roma, like three parts of the same set of fears.

Filmography

As director

• The lion part (1978)
• The beach of love (1979)
• The discotheque of love (1980)
• Time of rematch (1981)
• Last days of the victim (1982)
• The Stranger (1987)
• A place in the world (1992)
• Border law (1995)
• Martin (Hache) (1997)
• Common locations (2002)
• Rome (2004)

Interpreter

• Give your face (1962)...

Assistant director

• A woman (1975)
• The bionic superagents (1977)
• Explosive adventure (1977)
• Growing up.of Sergio Renán (1977)
• The superagents and the damn treasure (1978)
• The party of all (1979)

Second assistant director

• Impatient boys (1966)
• The girl on board (1967)
• The naked beast (1971)

Awards

Oscar Awards

Goya Awards

San Sebastian International Film Festival

Silver Condor Awards

Konex Prize