Chilean film chronology

Not always a pretty picture. Chile’s film industry went into decline in the late 1940s and hundreds of early films are lost or out of circulation. Much of what is available is mediocre at best (usually comedies and melodramas trying to emulate Mexico’s Golden Age). The “hidden gems”, of which there are admittedly many, are almost all in dire need of restoration and distribution. Good documentary and fiction work started to emerge in the late 1950s (with 1967-1973 being the years of the socially committed New Chilean Cinema) but the 1980s was the most barren period, as filmmakers went into exile after the US-backed...