Documentary
In the Hell of Chaco
En el infierno del Chaco
Roque Funes · 1932
Synopsis
The first three months of the conflict between Paraguay and Bolivia, filmed from the Paraguayan lines: the mobilisation, the columns cutting a passage through the forest, the artillery, a bayonet charge, a flight over the firing line, the attack on Boquerón and the Bolivian resistance, then the wounded and the prisoners marching towards Asunción. President Eusebio Ayala and Commander José Félix Estigarribia appear on screen. Animated maps and intertitles, made after the return, link the sequences.
Context
The Argentine cameraman left for the Chaco in July 1932 and returned a few months later to Buenos Aires, where he edited in a few days a film of a little under an hour, released on 21 December of the same year. On his return he declared that no one could imagine what the fighting was like out there. Held to be lost for decades, the film survived in a nitrate print from the Estragó family, restored in 2008 on the initiative of Hugo Gamarra. In 2026, the Cinemateca del Paraguay had the original print preserved, though its digitisation has yet to be done.
Who it is for
Fifty-three minutes, originally silent, with maps and intertitles. A disc released in 2022 adds music composed for it and a booklet intended for teachers. There are many images of the dead.
Prizes and reception
The first filmed account of the Chaco War, and one of the few films of the period to have survived in Paraguay.
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