A "detenido desaparecido" speaks from the past to the present

The Latin American dictatorships of the 70's and 80's were characterized by the thousands of cases of "detenidos desaparecidos". These were the people picked up off the streets and which simply "vanished" in the dark corridors of the local Gestapos. During many years these same regimes (all of them backed directly or indirectly by the CIA) denied the cases, even denied the very existence of these people.

But lately (at least in Chile) many of the remains of these persons have been recovered and identified. Fernando was detained a few days after the coup in 1973, he was only 17. In 1998 his remains were found in an illegal grave. The identification process took a long time, but was totally positive.

This film is about the reencounter of Fernando's wife, son and rest of his family both with his remains and the chilling truth of how he was killed.

The scene at the morgue is incredible. Both by the respect shown by the doctors to Fernando, the reencounter of his remains with his family after having dissapeared for over 20 years and how the remains of the body "tell" how he was beaten, tortured and killed.

Fernando now lies in a proper grave at the Santiago Cemetery. His story is a lesson on what never should happen again in our continent.

Silvio Caiozzi made this documentary as the story unfolded. It's a very hard film to see, because it's not been aired on TV in our country. I had the privilege of seeing it in a festival of Chilean Documentaries on DBSS a few weeks ago.

An excellent film

Spanish-language cinema across Spain and Latin America is united by its engagement with history, cultural identity, and social transformation. In Spain, films often balance artistic experimentation with popular genres while reflecting on memory, politics, and family. In Latin America, cinema has been deeply tied to questions of colonial legacy, resistance, and community resilience, ranging from intimate dramas to bold political allegories.

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Fernando ha vuelto

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