'The Red Hangar' Courtesy of Villano Share on Facebook Share on X Google Preferred Share to Flipboard Show additional share options Share on LinkedIn Share on Pinterest Share on Reddit Share on Tumblr Share on Whats App Send an Email Print the Article Post a Comment The Red Hangar (Hangar rojo), the fiction feature debut of Chilean director, producer and screenwriter Juan Pablo Sallato, may be set in 1970s Chile as a military coup unfolds, but the themes and human challenges it explores feel very timely. It tells the story of Captain Jorge Silva, a former head of Air Force Intelligence, who receives an order that will change his life forever. He is tasked with transforming the Air Force Academy where he trains young cadets into a center for detention and torture. The reason is the coup by a group of miltary officers, led by General Augusto Pinochet, that overthrew the socialist President Salvador Allende. Related Stories Movies 81 Artists, Including Tilda Swinton and Javier Bardem, Call Out Berlin Festival for "Silence" on Gaza Movies 'My Wife Cries' Review: A Couple's Breakup is Tackled With Artistry and Austerity in a German Drama Carried by French Actress Agathe Bonitzer The Red Hangar world premiered in the Perspectives section of emerging voices in the Berlin International Film Festival. Inspired by true events and shot in black and white, the movie has been described as the first Latin American thriller to explore the inner workings of the military during the dictatorships of the 1970s. Sallato previously directed the documentary Red Eyes and the series Addicted to the Horn, Freed, and The Culture of Sex. He directed The Red Hangar based on a screenplay by Luis Emilio Guzmán. The film stars Nicolás Zárate (Prison in the Andes, Inside the Mind of a Psychopath), Boris Quercia, Marcial Tagle, Catalina Stuardo, and Aron Hernández. Produced by Villano and co-produced by Brava Cine, Rain Dogs, Caravan, Berta Film and TVN. World sales are being handled by Premium Films/MPM Premium. Silva faces all sorts of dilemmas in the film. "Convinced that the horror will be short-lived, Silva tries to stay on the sidelines," reads a synopsis for The Red Hangar. "But the arrival of Colonel Jahn - an old rival who is returning with unchecked power and unfinished business - forces Silva to confront not only his past but also his deepest beliefs. As trucks begin to fill the hangar with prisoners and the exercise of power grows increasingly ruthless, Silva finds himself trapped at an impossible crossroads: disobedience could cost him his life, but then so could obedience, too." THR asked Sallato about the creation of The Red Hangar, the political and morally ambiguous issues it touches on, the timeliness of the film, and what he is working on next. Thank you for the powerful film and taking me inside these difficult moral choices. I am curious: Is Jorge Silva's story widely known in Chile, and is the film based on an autobiography, book or something like that?Thank you very much for your words. Jorge Silva's story is not widely known in Chile; it circulates mostly within a small circle of people who have studied that period. The most emblematic case connected to him is that of General Alberto Bachelet, father of former Chilean president Michelle Bachelet, who died after being tortured by the dictatorship. It was Captain Silva who was with him in his final moments at the Public Jail. The film is inspired by the autobiographical chronicle Disparen a la bandada by Fernando Villagrán, who is one of the two students whose lives Silva saves in the story. Villagrán conducted research on Chilean Air Force officers and non-commissioned officers who were tortured by their own comrades for refusing to participate in the coup. Through Fernando - who was actively involved in the production - we were able to meet Jorge Silva. Hearing him recount, in the first person, the exact moment when the coup unfolded was decisive. But what struck us most was the position from which he spoke: not from the high ranks of power, but from a middle ground where orders arrive fragmented, and obedience seems inevitable. That moral ambiguity and that perspective made us understand that this was the heart of the film. 'The Red Hangar' Courtesy of Villano Why did you decide on a black-and-white film?There were several signs that led me to black and white. The first appeared during my reading of the book. In one passage, Fernando Villagrán writes that when he woke up on Sept. 11, 1973, and learned of the military coup, everything suddenly seemed to him in black and white. That image felt deeply cinematic to me. A seed was planted there - the intuition that this story should be portrayed through that visual imagination. Interestingly, when I later mentioned the line to Fernando, he didn't even remember writing it, but it was there. The second reason was stylistic. My background is closely linked to art school, and many of my references come not only from cinema