Salvador Allende
On September 11, 1973, he was overthrown by a military coup... The dictator of Pinochet crushed that democracy which had perfected itself over two centuries, and destroyed, day after day, for 18 years, the country I knew.
Thousands of Chileans were murdered and tortured and hundreds of thousands went into exile.
This homage that Guzmán pays to Chile's ex-president reminds us of the radiant dream that a generation lived (where politics and utopia were synonyms).
The piece is direct. It has no explicative or demonstrative information; rather, it offers a space for reflection that is human and personal and at the same time historical.
The outcome is a generous film. "Salvador Allende" sold 120,000 tickets in France, with 34 copies in 5 months (from September 2004 to January 2005).
It premiered in theaters in: Belgium, Spain, Switzerland, Greece, Mexico, Austria, Italy, Canada, Argentina, Uruguay and Chile (50,000 viewers).
Salvador Allende was a man who tried to make radical changes in Chilean society through peaceful means, of course the ruling class never accepted this. Inmediately when being elected, the owners of the country, national and foreign started to plot to destroy the economy. Allende governed according to the constitution, in spite of terrorism and sabotage made by the ultra-right.
In spite of the dramatic situation his government got over 42% of votes in the last parlamentary election before the military coup. We also have to take in account that in the cold war scenario, his "Chilean way to socialism" was not very popular internationally, it was a "bad example" for the other American countries trying to free from the USA dominion.
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After reading about Allende and his upbringing (upper class), I believe he wanted to help the majority of Chileans. Of course, the rich do not like to be disturbed. They are happy with the staus quo. I don't give a damn what political party he was from as long as he worked to improve Chile. Which it looked like was happening until our CIA decided to destroy their economy. No wonder a lot of the world hates us. We meddle where we don't belong and conspire againt our own people with lies about the "danger" of people who don't go along with us. The only "danger" is to the lying politicians and CEO's.
please can you upload the video its not available currently.
Are you guys nuts??
Allende was having anybody with property murdered or kicked out of the country when he took power. This piece is pure propaganda and a series of half truths about a very brutal administration.
I have met the Chilean wine makers that were in Chile when Allende took power. Within days of Allende taking power they were getting phone calls telling them to leave Chile and surrender their property or the following day they would be their to torture and execute them.
I seriously cannot understand what it is with some people that bust a nut over any murdering Marxist. Castro, Chavez, and Allende.
The most significant part of this video...to me in particular...was that this man was a dreamer.
A man who sought to use electoral politics to change the status quo in a country that had long allowed the minority to thrive off the labor, land, and rights of the majority "THE WORKERS AND THE POOR."
HE SUCCEEDED!!! to a certain extend, however Allende was a dreamer in the cold war era that did not favor U.S. influence and power.
I can not help but feel anger hearing the ambassador continuously describe the desire of Nixon to see this democratically elected socialist president fall by any means necessary. His claim to "Make the economy scream" say's it all in his ideological stance against a proclaim Marxist that would swing the balance of influence towards the USSR.
If this was so... then why did the left split in Chile
Why didn't Allende proclaim arm struggle and ask the
people to rise as an army in defense of the vision they
had constructed for Chile.
It is heard several times throughout the documentary 'This
is a unique case' the path to victory was not through gorilla arm struggle, it was through the vote. And it was
for this very reason that it was necessary for the U.S. to
end Allendes presidency... The left in all of Latin America
had to know that neither through peaceful measure or through
gorilla fighting would another Cuba be allowed in the Western Hemisphere.
Unfortunately the U.S. had a major role to play in the coup that lead 18 years of harsh repression by a dictatorship.
No they in fact did mention that after one year of a great economy, Chile began to collapse due to CIA sponsored embargoes and partisans. You however, Robert, have failed to mention that it was only after the USA decided to destroy Chile and the actions that followed that there was a crisis at all.
Most of the country did not vote for him. Just like most of the country didn't vote for any President before. That is how multi-party democracies work - pluralities.
And as a note the major reason he lost to FREI is because the CIA started a MASSIVE propaganda campaign to discredit and slander Allende. They bought out almost every paper and radio station in the country to do so. If left alone, Allende probably would have won then and there.
Of course, these are all well known things that anyone with the actual desire to learn about the coup and Allende can look up.
PS: He wasn't a nationalist, he was an internationalist as most socialists are.
A very favorable portrait of Allende. He was an idealistic nationalist and man of priniciple; therefore, he had no place in politics.
The film failed to mention that his actions resulted in an economic crisis that almost completely destroyed the country economically and if one does the math, most of the country did not vote for him or Popular Unity in any of the elections.
I would probably love this doc if I understood Spanish.
I admire that man greatly. Its painful to watch and learn of such an important figure (who took noble, courageous action for the better of the people) have his efforts destroyed by such malevolence. Even more painful that it was a malevolence fed by an outside force, that force being the government of my own country.