In Argentina, Much Ado About ‘Evita’

Resurrected by Hollywood, Eva Peron has returned to Argentina in a characteristic blaze of hype, strife and emotion.

Monday’s Argentine premiere of the film version of Disney’s rock opera “Evita” was a much-anticipated event that combined several Argentine obsessions: the legendary first lady, the world’s opinion of Argentina and Argentina’s opinion of itself.

And the reaction displayed the enduring ferocity of the eternal national argument over Evita, who is both worshiped and despised because of her populist flamboyance. Squads of police guarded previews for journalists and VIPs. Politicians urged a boycott. It was reported that a record-breaking boom in tourism here has been fed by publicity about the movie and its star, Madonna, who now provokes the same bitter debate here as the icon she portrays.

“Evita disembarks again, with no less fanfare of bells, crowds, journalists, flowered dresses and a commotion of fashion designers and improvised sociologists,” commented novelist Abel Posse, author of one of numerous recent books about the wife of three-time president Juan Domingo Peron. “More than a return, an evitista invasion.”

The celluloid invasion was received with hostility by none other than Argentine Vice President Carlos Ruckauf, a leader of the political party that bears Peron’s name. Orthodox Peronists claim the film insults Evita’s memory by portraying her as a loose woman. Ruckauf called Sunday for Argentines to boycott the film because it “converts her in a vulgar woman and makes Argentina look ridiculous.”

Ruckauf’s words set the tone for Monday’s unruly news conference with Alan Parker, the film’s director, in the elegant Hotel Alvear Palace. Several hundred journalists crowded beneath the chandeliers of a Parisian-style ballroom, which at times resembled a lion’s den. The press in Argentina is free, fierce and apparently as divided as everyone else about the merits of the real-life and cinematic Evitas.

Some reporters greeted Parker with applause and asked respectful questions. Others sputtered with indignation and criticism. The two camps traded insults, moans and jeers, threatening occasionally to turn the proceedings into an intramural debate.

Parker responded with considerable serenity. He pointedly returned the vice president’s fire, chastising Ruckauf for his admission that he has not seen the film and does not intend to do so.

“The most important thing in a democracy is freedom of speech,” Parker said. “To tell people not to go see something is something that I as an artist cannot agree with. And it’s very ignorant of him to say anything before he sees the film.”

In contrast, Parker said, President Carlos Menem wrote him a letter of congratulations for his triumph at the Golden Globe Awards recently. The president’s chief of staff wished him well upon his arrival in Argentina last week, Parker said.

President Menem, who is on a trade mission to Southeast Asia, overrode objections of party leaders and granted Madonna’s request last year to film the crucial scene in which she sings “Don’t Cry for Me, Argentina” on the balcony of the presidential palace.

But Menem later reacted with displeasure to a Vanity Fair article by Madonna in which she recounted the hectic process of filming. The article caused a stir here because of negative comments about the weather, the food, the swarming crowds and Madonna’s assertion that the president had stared at her suggestively.

Parker said Monday’s press conference was “just as scary” as an encounter with journalists here last year. But he added that during the filming, “I had a really wonderful time. I love this country. . . . By the time we left, I was very sad to leave.”

Although Parker reiterated the obvious--that he made a rock opera rather than a documentary--the big-budget epic’s portrayal of history has received withering scrutiny. Journalists grilled Parker about details such as what books he used for his research and why extras in the massive funeral scene wear short sleeves if Evita died in winter.

In a heated exchange, Parker declared: “As a historical reproduction, this film is really good. Better by a hundred times than anything your television stations ever did. So I will not take your criticism, because the film is beautifully done.”

Beyond the impact of on-camera verbal brawls, the premiere has only accelerated a wave of Evita nostalgia and revisionism that began with the decision to make the film. Critics continue to weigh in. A typical comment came from Alicia Dujovne Ortiz, who wrote in the La Nacion newspaper that the film has in much in common with Argentine reality as Disney’s animated version of “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” had with the Victor Hugo novel: “A typically North American appropriation.”

On the other hand, novelist Posse rejected such phobias of cultural imperialism. He declared himself won over by the work of the artist who some regard as the ultimate U.S. cultural product: Madonna.

“Madonna succeeds in the end in saving the movie from catastrophe and even transmitting the essence of Evita: pain, passion, rage, courage, love,” Posse said.

The last and most definitive word will come on Thursday, when Evita opens to the public. Parker said that the response of everyday Argentines--Evita’s adored and adoring masses--means the most to him.

“I believe the film is very respectful to Argentine people,” he told the journalists. “And I think it’s important to see how the audience reacts to it. It’s more important, the audience, than all of you.”