Tango (Spanish: Tango, no me dejes nunca, translation: Tango, never leave me) is a 1998 Argentine-Spanish musical drama film written and directed by Carlos Saura and starring Miguel Ángel Solá and Mía Maestro. It was photographed by cinematographer Vittorio Storaro.
Contents
Plot
In Buenos Aires, Mario Suárez, a middle-aged theatre director, finds himself holed up in his apartment, licking his wounds when his girlfriend (and principal dancer) Laura leaves him. Seeking distraction, he throws himself into his next project, a musical about the tango. One evening, while meeting with his backers, he is introduced to a beautiful young woman, Elena, who is the girlfriend of his chief investor Angelo, a shady businessman with underworld connections.
Angelo asks Mario to audition Elena. He does so and is immediately captivated by her. Eventually, he takes her out of the chorus and gives her a leading role. An affair develops between them, but the possessive Angelo has her followed and threatens her with dire consequences if she leaves him, mirroring Mario's own feelings and actions towards Laura before Elena entered his life.
The investors are unhappy with some of Mario's dance sequences. They don't like a routine that criticizes the violent military repression and torture of the past. Angelo has been given a small part, which he takes very seriously. The lines between fact and fiction begin to blur: during a scene in the musical showing immigrants newly arrived in Argentina, two men fight over the character played by Elena. She is stabbed. Only slowly do we realize that her death is not real.
Cast
Miguel Ángel Solá as Mario Suárez
Mía Maestro as Elena Flores
Cecilia Narova as Laura Fuentes
Juan Luis Galiardo as Angelo Larroca
Juan Carlos Copes as Carlos Nebbia
Carlos Rivarola as Ernesto Landi
Sandra Ballesteros as María Elman
Óscar Cardozo Ocampo as Daniel Stein
Enrique Pinti as Sergio Lieman
Julio Bocca as Julio Bocca
Martín Seefeld as Andrés Castro
Production
Tango was shown out of competition at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival.
Reception
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 68% of 22 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 6.7/10. The website's consensus reads: "Tango makes a few false moves, but this dance-driven fantasy steps just the right side of the line between stultifying and seductive."
Accolades
Wins
1998 - Goya Award for Best Sound.
1998 - Grand Prix Technique de la CST (Vittorio Storaro) at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival.
1998 - San Diego Film Critics Society Awards for Best Foreign Language Film
1998 - CEC Awards for Best Cinematography (Vittorio Storaro)
1998 - CEC Awards for Best Music (Lalo Schifrin)
Nominations
1998 - Academy Award Best Foreign Language Film by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
1998 - Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
Home media
Tango was issued on DVD by Sony Pictures in August 1999, in Spanish with English subtitles.