Héctor Alterio Movies
- 1980
- PG
The complex relationship between a thirteen-year-old girl (Ana Torrent) and an old man living in lonely but wealthy splendor is the focus of this drama. Alejandro (Hector Alterio) spends his time playing chess on a computer, riding his horses, or enjoying classical music. His life starts to change under the influence of young Goyita (Torrent) who slowly becomes a friend and then begins to impose on him in not-so-subtle ways. First she wants him to burn his dead wife's clothing, and before long she intends to involve him in a plot of revenge against a Civil Guard. Torrent received a 1980 Best Actress award at the Montreal Film Festival for her performance. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Héctor Alterio, Ana Torrent, (more)
- 1980
In a gross miscarriage of justice, based on an actual event, two men are falsely accused and convicted of the murder of a missing shepherd from a small Spanish village. A despotic district court judge and a right-wing congressman orchestrate the trial. The two men are subjected to brutal torture by sadistic guards to exact a confession of guilt. The men serve 6 years of a 15-year prison term before they are released, and they later discover their alleged victim is alive and well in a neighboring village. The 15-minute torture scene is harrowing, as is the subsequent passage of the exhuming of human corpses. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Amparo Soler Leal, Héctor Alterio, (more)
- 1980
In this comedy-melodrama, Nestor (Hector Alterio) is an inept romantic who is blessed with the best son a father could have, young Sebastian (Adrian Ferrario). The contrast between father and son forms the pivot around which the story and the comedy revolve. Serious moments are introduced when Sebastian becomes gravely ill thanks to his bumbling father and when Nestor mangages to win the heart of Sebastian's attractive teacher (Graciela Alfano). ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Héctor Alterio
- 1979
In this melodrama, Leticia is an upper-class girl who falls in love with an unhappily married tutor, despite the fact that the tutor's wife is her piano teacher. Leticia's father somehow finds out about the attachment between the two and confronts the tutor, who then commits suicide. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Ramiro Oliveros, Jeannine Mestre, (more)
- 1979
The Spanish title literally translates as "three in a row," and is an apt description of the romantic relationship between two men and the girl they love. Because they are all friends, they try to find some way of surviving together. When they try their hand at robbery, they have the misfortune of choosing to rob a shop which turns out to belong to one of the boys' aunts. On another occasion, a mugging turns into a beating for the three of them. Such episodes punctuate the comic story of their friendship, up to the point when one of the boys wins the girl's hand in marriage. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Pepe Munne, Inaki Miramon, (more)
- 1979
Two wealthy and powerful Catalan families have gathered at the Martis mansion to celebrate the betrothal of their children. The alliance between these aristocratic families is taking place for expedient reasons: romance has no place in the conveniently arranged upcoming marriage, except by convention. Awkward speeches are made by the two families gathered in the house of the bride's family. Meanwhile, the family piano teacher and Fina's future husband have gone off for a little privacy, and they have a sexual interlude. They are interrupted by the boy's father, who sends the teacher away and takes the chastened boy downstairs for the obligatory cheerful photographs. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Isabel Mestres
- 1979
Even though she has a loving husband and several lovers, Marian was so traumatized by the events of her late childhood that she is unable to relax and enjoy being loved. Her difficulties began when, shortly after her beloved father's death, she caught her mother in bed with the family doctor. Nearly everything she sees in this film seems to remind her of that incident, or of her relationship with her father. Nonetheless, when she finally meets someone whose appearance recapitulates that of her father, she begins to thaw out. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Isabel Mestres, Javier Escriva, (more)
- 1978
This allegorical drama is said to depict the state of Spanish society under Franco's dictatorship, and the film won the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival in 1978. In the story, nothing can possibly go wrong at the annual dinner of the fishing club. Nothing will go wrong. The members are determined to see it just that way, despite evidence to the contrary. A mob of outsiders just tried to crash the party. The cooks briefly went on strike but were persuaded to serve up the members' catch of trout anyway. The fish is liberally dosed with good-tasting sauces. Despite the awful taste, the fish cannot possibly be rotten -- after all, the loyal members of the club just caught them. Nothing is wrong with the members either, although they appear to be dying. The party will go on, the usual self-congratulatory speeches will be made, and the awards will be given. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Héctor Alterio, Ofelia Angelica, (more)
- 1978
In this non-narrative film by first-time director Rafael Gordon, a young limousine driver and his friends discuss their qualms about the society they live in, while they drift from situation to situation. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Verónica Forqué, Héctor Alterio, (more)
- 1978
Mañuel Azana was the last man elected as president of the Spanish Republic before the Spanish Civil War. In this 1970s film, Spanish schoolchildren are taught about him in their history classes but get the name confused, referring to him as "Hazana." Because for them he represents a kind of freedom not seen under the Franco regime, he stands for every kind of freedom. Since these youngsters in this film are suffering from an extremely rigid and dictatorial educational system, the name "Hazana" becomes a byword for them as they attempt in their own modest way to foment a revolution. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Fernando Fernán Gómez, Héctor Alterio, (more)
- 1977
Circumstances surrounding the tragic death of famed Spanish poet and playwright Federico Garcia Lorca (1898-1936) emerge in counterpoint with the current life of a homosexual stage-magician. Jose (Hector Alterio) was making love to the poet's brother in the Garcia Lorca family garden in 1936 when the poet was killed. Jose and Federico's brother witnessed the whole thing. In the present, he meets another man who had been the brother's lover, and more details emerge. Meanwhile, he has a lovely old apartment in Madrid, a new lover, and a cozy relationship with a widow and her teenaged son. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Héctor Alterio, Xavier Elorriaga, (more)
- 1977
A married professional man and an equally married woman become lovers in the last days of Franco's rule in Spain. The two were an item when they were in college, and both of them are bored with their married state. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- José M. Sacristán
- 1977
When he realizes that he now has no real connection with anyone, Maximo Gascon (Ignacio Fernandez de Castro) tries to reach out to his daughter. Everyone else he felt connected to is dead or has left him behind. Despite many attempts to break through the invisible barrier which cuts him off from genuine emotional communication, he is unsuccessful. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gracia Querejeta
- 1977
Told from a four-year-old's perspective, this film explores one day in the life of Quico (Lolo Garcia), the child of a middle-class Madrid family. His adored father (Hector Alterio) fought with Franco's troops against the Republicans, and never tires of telling the boy stories of his exploits. Among the toddler's many endearing pranks on that day alone, he pretends to have swallowed a needle, floods the bathroom by stopping up the toilet, and generally misinterprets everything he hears to fit what he is able to understand. Meanwhile, the boy also sees and understands a great deal more than the grown-ups around him would be happy knowing about: such as that his parents aren't getting along and that the maid has a lover. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Teresa Gimpera, Héctor Alterio, (more)
- 1976
With dialogue spoken in the dialect of Spanish used in Estremadura, this drama examines the life of a man who, in a psychopathic frenzy, kills his dog, his horse, his mother, and local citizens, before being captured by soldiers and executed. The story is based on the book La Familia de Pascual Duarte by Camilio Jose Cela. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- José Luis Gómez, Héctor Alterio, (more)
- 1975
Carlos Saura wrote and directed this powerful psychological drama in which family crises which reflect the embattled soul of a nation are seen through the eyes of an unusually perceptive child. Ana (Ana Torrent) is an eight-year-old girl growing up in a troubled household -- her father Anselmo (Hector Alterio) is a general in the Spanish military during the waning days of Franco's repressive regime, and her mother (Geraldine Chaplin) is dead, Ana having witnessed her agonizing final moments. Anna, her older sister Irene (Conchita Perez) and younger sister Juana (Maite Sanchez) are looked after by their emotionally chilly Aunt Paulina (Monica Randall), while housekeeper Rosa (Florinda Chico) provides what little warmth there is to be found in the household. While Ana's mother is gone, the girl frequently sees and hears her mother's spirit, and is convinced Anselmo's emotional neglect and infidelity is responsible for her death, leading the youngster to take her own form of revenge against her father. The title Cria Cuervos is taken from a Spanish proverb -- "Raise ravens and they'll pluck out your eyes." The film was originally released in the United States under title Cria!, and has been screened in English-speaking territories as Raise Ravens and The Secret of Ana. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- 1974
In the 1920s, workers in the far southern province of Argentina went on strike for better working and living conditions. In this film, the story of that strike is depicted. The military commander sent to investigate decides that the strikers' complaints are justified, and he signs an agreement with them. As soon as he leaves, the industrialists and landowners ignore the agreement. When the workers strike again, the owners convince the government that this strike has been caused by the subversive action of the Chilean government, and the strikers are massacred. Only after the tragedy does the military commander realize that he has been duped. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- 1974
Life has lost its savor for the middle-aged widower in this drama. He keeps on at his job, but his grown children are a puzzle to him. One of his sons treats him with surly indifference when he sees him, which isn't often. The other son, it is increasingly clear, is a homosexual. However, when he begins an affair with a new employee in his office, a girl young enough to be his daughter, he experiences a brief sunny interlude. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- 1973
The elaborate plans of a group of would-be revolutionaries in the 1930s are foiled, in this Argentine film, when a group of military men pull off a coup and use the stated aspirations of the civilian group to justify their actions. Since the muddle-headed revolutionaries couldn't decide whether they wanted a government of the right-wing or the left, but could only determine that they wanted a "successful" one, they have no basis for objections. The movie follows the revolutionaries' story through one of its members, a disillusioned and idealistic intellectual. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- 1973
The rapacious exploitation of South American resources by foreign companies is not a new phenomenon; it began with Christopher Columbus and continues today. However, the cynicism, greed and inhumanity of a 19th-century British company in exploiting the quebracho forests of the Chaco in northern Argentina has rarely been equalled. This drama shows how the corporation, with the cooperation of authorities, enslaved the local population to harvest every one of the tannin-producing (but slow-growing) quebracho trees, leaving behind a decimated and impoverished population and a wasteland with no quebracho trees. The film also shows how the resistance of the local people was brutally suppressed so that the lucrative trade could continue. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- 1972
The names have been changed to protect the guilty in this crime thriller that is based on the exploits of Argentine mafiosi in the '20s and '30s. Francesco Donato (Jose Slavin) is the current godfather of the Argentine mafia, but his assistant Luciano (Alfredo Alcon) wants his job. He believes he knows ways to expand their business beyond prostitution and protection rackets. His kidnap and murder of a prominent millionaire gives the mob really bad press. Indeed, the resulting public furor results in the police cracking down hard on all gangster activities, which is not good for Luciano's longevity. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- 1970
Alfredo Alcon stars as the Argentine military hero General Jose de San Martin. He falls in love and marries the beautiful Remedios de Escalada (Evangelina Salazar) who gives birth to the couple's daughter before her untimely demise. San Martin helps to liberate Argentina, Peru and Chile from Spanish control. Hector Alterio is Simon Bolivar in this historical drama and love story. The general makes an adventurous and dangerous crossing of the Andes Mountains and engages in several military clashes that test the bravery of the freedom fighters. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Alfredo Alcon, Lautaro Murúa, (more)
- 1969
This film version of the classic Argentine novel by Ricardo Guiraldes features Don Segundo Sombra as the heroic gaucho who rides the treeless pampas of his native land. The author's nephew Adolfo Guiraldes, an expert on Argentine folk stories, was chosen to play the title role. The director used the book instead of a script, as he faithfully shot scenes page-by-page to insure the authenticity demanded by the writer's heirs. A handful of professional actors augment the largely local cast of this slice of Argentine life from the beginning of the 20th century. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Juan Carballido
