The Argentine/Guerrilla - Che Guevara biopics

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Guerrilla is Next for Soderbergh
Source: Production Weekly December 9, 2005

Steven Soderbergh will next director Guerrilla, a biopic about Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara that will star Benjamin Bratt, reports Production Weekly.

Born in 1928, Ernesto "Che" Guevara first trained as a doctor before becoming Fidel Castro's chief lieutenant. In 1967, he was captured and executed by Bolivian forces.

Guerrilla is set to begin production January 21 in New York, with locations in the Mexican state of Veracruz.

Soderbergh is also scheduled to helm Life Interrupted, the monologue that Spalding Gray was working on when he died in the early winter of 2004.

[jigzaw]

This is a real difficult subject for me because my family came from Cuba in the 60's, barely, after my grandfather managed to avoid being hunted down by idealists like Che for simply doubting Communism.  How Communism, which has killed millions more innocent people than even nazism did, manages to get a free pass in our popular culture really boggles my mind.  No one would wear a t-shirt or make a glorifying movie featuring one of Hitler's right-hand guys and expect to be taken seriously.  If this film is a real biography and not just another Rebel Without a Cause-style hero-worshipping porn film about Che, then I might see it.  But I wouldn't expect a film that was honest about Che could even get funding in Hollywood, frankly.

[killafilm]

Was there no honesty in The Motorcycle Diaries?

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[pete]

Was there no honesty in The Motorcycle Diaries?

not much. 

[killafilm]

I'm going to have to disagree.

[pete]

you're going to have to read more than one book on what became of che guevara.

[killafilm]

That's what became of him.  I think his view of the world as portrayed in M. Diaries is a very pure and honest feeling.  One of care for other people, HIS people.  I don't think that the movies lack of his later life takes away from the beauty of seeing ones country and finding a feeling belongingness, love, sorrow, anger, what have you...

It certainly made me want to see more of America.

[MacGuffin]

New movie on Che Guevara's life films at UN

With little hoopla, the United Nations has hosted its second-ever film production, serving as a backdrop for parts of a coming epic about Argentine revolutionary Che Guevara starring Latin heart-throb Benicio Del Toro.

Scenes for the film "Che," expected to be released later this year, were filmed at the world body's New York headquarters last weekend, making it only the second movie to be shot inside the U.N. compound since it was built in 1952, U.N. chief spokesman Stephane Dujarric said on Thursday.

"Che" is being directed by Steven Soderbergh, whose previous works include "Ocean's Eleven" and "Sex, Lies, and Videotape."

Ernesto Che Guevara was Cuban leader Fidel Castro's right-hand man during the revolution that brought Castro to power in 1959.

He later traveled to the United Nations -- a visit immortalized in the film -- before being killed in Bolivia in October 1967 while attempting to foment revolution there.

Director Sidney Pollack's "The Interpreter" starring Nicole Kidman and Sean Penn was the first film to be shot at the United Nations, filmed there over 18 weekends in 2004 and released last year.

Before then, the United Nations had a history of refusing to allow the building to be used for commercial purposes, turning away even Alfred Hitchcock's request to film in the delegates' lounge for the 1959 "North by Northwest."

Among his other films, the popular Del Toro plays the role of hard-working cop Javier Rodriguez in "Traffic" and Dr. Gonzo in "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas."

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Scenes for the film "Che," expected to be released later this year

Bubble, Good German, Che  all 2006?!?  who does he think he is, Ryan Adams?

[squints]

Scenes for the film "Che," expected to be released later this year

Bubble, Good German, Che  all 2006?!?  who does he think he is, Ryan Adams?

i'm sure soderbergh could write better songs than ryan adams

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Ormond Cast in Soderbergh's Che
Source: Variety January 29, 2006

Julia Ormond has been cast in Steven Soderbergh's Che, about the Latin American political revolutionary. Ormond will play a female reporter in the film, which is currently shooting in New York City.

Ormond recently wrapped David Lynch's Inland Empire. Her credits include Sabrina and Legends of the Fall.

[MacGuffin]

Soderbergh turns a Che double play
Del Toro set to play revolutionary in Guevara pics
Source: Variety

Steven Soderbergh is finally ready to make his long-gestating biopic of Latin American revolutionary Che Guevara.

And the film's backers are betting that Guevara, who continues to sell books and T-shirts almost 40 years after his execution in Bolivia, has an aura large enough to sustain two films.

Soderbergh will shoot them back to back, using mostly Spanish dialogue. Production begins next May in Mexico and other South American locations.

Benicio Del Toro will play Guevara, and Javier Bardem, Franka Potente and Benjamin Bratt are in talks to play key roles. Producer is Laura Bickford, who began working on the project with Del Toro and Soderbergh right after they made "Traffic" together.

Lead financier is Paris-based Wild Bunch, which also hung in through twists and turns that included Terrence Malick committing to direct and then dropping out to make "The New World" in 2004. Wild Bunch will co-finance and shop the pictures at AFM.

The films will be made as Spanish co-productions, with Spain-based Morena Films and broadcaster Telecinco in final talks to be co-producers. Combined budget for the pic pair is less than $70 million. Talks are under way with domestic distributors.

Both films pick up after the formative Guevara years captured in the Walter Salles-directed "The Motorcycle Diaries" in 2004.

First film, "The Argentine," begins as Che and a band of Cuban exiles (led by Fidel Castro) reach the Cuban shore from Mexico in 1956. Within two years, they mobilized popular support and an army and toppled the U.S.-friendly regime of dictator Fulgencio Batista.

The second film, "Guerrilla," begins with Che's trip to New York, where he spoke at the United Nations in 1964 and was celebrated in society circles.

Soderbergh has already shot that opening footage with Del Toro and Julia Ormond, who plays TV journo Lisa Howard. Journalist acted as an informal intermediary between the Kennedy White House and Cuba.

Guevara disappeared into the jungles of South America. When he tried to use Bolivia as the catalyst for more revolution, he was captured and executed.

Both scripts were written by Peter Buchman, who, with Del Toro, has been working with a translator to put the dialogue into Spanish.

Filmmakers also have been shooting a companion documentary while researching the film, including interviews with many of those who fought alongside Guevara in Cuba and in Bolivia.

Soderbergh recently completed Europe-set WWII film "The Good German."

Buchman scripted one of the unmade Alexander the Great pictures and most recently wrote the Fox fantasy film "Eragon" and the currently casting "The Piano Tuner" at Focus.

Along with "Diaries," Guevara was the subject of another recent pic, 2005's "Che Guevara," directed by Josh Evans.

[MacGuffin]

THE BLOODY TRUTH ABOUT CHE
Source: Page Six

SOME historians are already concerned about "Che," the movie Steven Soderbergh is directing with Benicio Del Toro starring as the Communist revolutionary. Soderbergh seems intent on portraying Ernesto "Che" Guevara as a hero, who battled alongside Fidel Castro to free Cuba from a corrupt imperialist government, and then was martyred by the CIA. Soderbergh will no doubt gloss over the six months after Castro seized power in 1959, when Che was in charge of La Cabana fortress, overseeing the trial and execution of 600 political prisoners. "To witness such butchery is a trauma that will accompany me to my grave," recalled José Vilasuso, a lawyer who worked under Che. "The walls of that medieval castle received the echoes of the rhythmic footstep of the squad, the clicking of the rifles . . . the sorry howling of the dying . . . the macabre silence . . . " Soderbergh had no comment.

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"B" Script Review for The Argentine from Latino Review...

SPOILERS
http://www.latinoreview.com/scriptreview.php?id=45

"D" Script Review for Guerilla from Latino Review...

SPOILERS
http://www.latinoreview.com/scriptreview.php?id=46