Abstract
The invention of cinema in Latin America was not only accepted as a manifestation of technical progress, but as well it was perceived as a tool used to spread political ideas. This gradually led to the births of cine militante (militant cinema) whose important representative is the film Hour of the Blast Furnaces.
Its director, Fernando Solanas, comes from an anti-peronist family and he is influenced by a number of filmmakers and temporary leftist ideas. His aim is to make a fresco of Argentina.
Later on, Octavio Getino joined the film preparation. Along with the initial works on the movie, a new group was established, Cine Liberación.
In that time, new other groups of militant cinema emerged. In the scope of Cine Liberación, several notable films are made.
The group's activity ends in 1974. The Hour of the Blast Furnaces is divided into three parts and it is supposed to be a movie-action.
The shooting takes place without a screenplay. Main stylistic features are edition and voice outside the picture.
Different versions of film exist, it is because formally it was destined to be interrupted and it was welcomed if its content changed in relation to current situation. Each part is stylistically different - essay, political analysis, didactic agitation.
After the film was made, a manifesto called For the third film was written. It summarizes theoretical postulates presented in the film.
From contemporary point of view, the Hour of the Blast Furnaces is interesting in terms of aesthetics and as a witness of politically turbulent time. Ideas and used political argumentation are clearly manipulative and calculated, even though the author's aims were sincere.
In the end, it is a demonstration of certain kind of extremism, even though from the opposite side.