The scene is almost surgical. Adrian Suar and Maggie Civantos enter incognito into the restricted area of a laboratory (recreated for fiction) and any false move that hinders the ongoing mission compromises them. There is tension, exchange of glances and a threatening atmosphere that, until the cry of “cut”, plays a crucial role in the outcome of Checkmatethe new action comedy starring Suar and the Spanish star of Vis a Vis y The cable girls.
But Suar’s return to the cinema, premiering in theaters on January 25 and then streaming on Amazon Prime Video, not only rests on the golden return to the genre that saw him take off with Polyladron on TV (1995-1997) and Wild cards in cinema (1997). It is the mix of an international cast, which is completed by the Israeli actor Tsahi Halevi (Fauda) and the Mexican comedian José Eduardo Derbez, which completes the project directed by Jorge Nisco.
“It’s my idea. A police officer who had been in his head for about four years and knew that at some point he was going to fit in. It has touches of humor, but it is not a hilarious comedy,” clarifies Suar, who is also the film’s producer. In Checkmate plays a secret agent (Duque), who leads a special brigade to rescue his niece, kidnapped by the villain of the story (Mike Amigorena). The adventures will be chained between fights, explosions and some gags.
“I wanted to return to this format. It’s been a long time since I did action films because I was opting more for comedies and other things. It was like going back a little to what we had done with Wild cards (also directed by Nisco) in 1997,” analyzes Suar.
“You will see the high level he has. Many years passed, everything regarding technique and special effects improved. Federico Cueva, a specialist in action scenes, worked with us (Torrent 4 y 5the Serie El Cid) who today is living in Spain and even makes films for India.”
One thing to keep in mind: Checkmate It will be the first Argentine fiction film to be released in 4D E-Motion theaters. What does this imply? That the viewer will be able to perceive wind, vibrations and aromas in sync with what happens on the screen.
The brigade inside
Filming began in Mendoza and continued in Buenos Aires. Mates, lunches and off-set Buenos Aires outings, with Suar as host, became part of a parallel itinerary. “I invited them to dinner, to the theater. I’m going to miss them a lot because I got along very well with them,” confirms Suar about the chemistry installed. And he adds: “Maggie is divine, I want her to stay. We all get along without knowing each other, which is unusual. The same thing happened with the rest of the cast: Mike Amigorena, Benjamín Amadeo and Charo López.”
“It’s my first time in Argentina and I loved the food. I was very nervous about working in a country where I don’t know anyone, but I was surprised by my colleagues,” highlights Derbez, the Mexican of the group, who with Checkmate debuts in the action genre. His character in the agent brigade “is a tequila fan, obviously, and he really likes dynamite and explosions, which is what he does.” Derbez was fascinated by Mendoza for the landscapes (“which helped us a lot with the shots of chases and gunshots”) and also for the vineyards (“spectacular!”).
Just as enthusiastic, although with a history of visits to Buenos Aires, Halevi, the star of Faudawhat in Checkmate he plays a computer specialist: “Until now, no Israeli has worked in Argentine cinema. It’s something very special to film so far from my country. I didn’t know Suar, but my wife did. Then I started watching her movies and here I found a generous, funny person who, despite who he is, understands teamwork.”
Among the challenges ahead, this actor and musician who speaks five languages intends to perfect his Spanish: “After my service in the Israeli Army, at the age of 22, I came to Argentina a couple of times and had a girlfriend from here who It helped me a lot to learn Spanish. I also have a two-year-old son who speaks Arabic, Hebrew, English and already speaks Spanish. My wife speaks good Spanish because she learned from soap operas.”
“I was lucky enough to do drama, comedy, action and it is always good to know that what you are doing is successful and recognized in the world,” says Halevi, who during his incognito stay in Argentina could not avoid crossing paths with fans. from the famous Israeli Netflix series. “They asked me what I was doing here, but I couldn’t say anything,” he says.
Pushing for it to happen “with the perfect project,” Maggie Civantos broke the ice in the country that knows her for her stardom in popular streaming series: “For me, Argentina had something familiar in itself and I came with all the expectations of the world. I have had loyal followers here for years and more joined with the Vis a Vis boom. What’s happening to me is that I’m very nostalgic and I don’t want to leave. Everything fell into place and I hope it is the beginning of a career in Argentina, because I feel like I am leaving a little piece of my home.”
Civantos admits that, between the bumps in filming, he treated himself to a meeting with Buenos Aires fans “that I felt I owed them” and a well-deserved trip to end filming to the Iguazú Falls, Bariloche and San Martín de los Andes. “I only had six days free, but later I would like to go to the North and see Salta,” he clarifies.
Civantos’s “Argentinization” is profound, to the point that he carries his own mate equipment: “I take it and I feel at home. They say that there is a very strong bond between Spain and Argentina and it is not a lie, I can feel it.”
It was the Argentine actor Esteban Meloni, with whom he filmed the series expresswho baited him first and now he became a habit.
About his role in Checkmate, says: “I feel very comfortable in action because I have done a lot, but I haven’t done comedy in a while and alongside Adrián, who is a genius, I have learned a lot. He gives me a lot of security, he supports me and I thank him for that.” In Spain, a moment of rest awaits her (“I’m going to stop for a bit because I’ve just done three projects in a row”) and her reunion with her producer (“I want to be focused there”).
put the body
“I think that Checkmate It is going to be an important film in my career as a producer and actor,” predicts Adrián Suar. And it is likely that his faith is sustained in the effectiveness of Leandro Calderone’s script and in the direction of Nisco, with whom he has been a creative duo for three decades, but also in the fact that he has put his all into filming, to the point of having finished with several bruises. Impersonating the audacious Duke took him two months of rehearsals just to practice blows, falls and holds.
“I didn’t train a particular martial art but the choreographies of the fights. He dedicated two weekly practices of several hours to learn the movements that were outlined in the script. Obviously, during the filming, I was hit and beaten, but I have the ability to copy certain choreographies and give the impression that I am James Bond. I like doing it, I’m not afraid. And although we were quite careful, of course I ended up with some bruises, nothing serious beyond two or three days of pain,” she specifies.
“It still gives me the physique for action movies, but it demands a lot from you in the fight and running scenes. The melee is nice and, although I did most of the shots, I had stunt doubles because going through glass still doesn’t work for me,” she clarifies with humor.
Checkmate It is a return to the sources in his professional career, but also the reunion with a cinema that he greatly enjoys as a spectator: “I like watching action movies. The classics, for example: Mission Impossible, James Bond… There are countless products of these characteristics in the world that are good. With CheckmateDepending on the budget you have, we have lived up to what is done internationally. That gives me a lot of pride.”
29 years ago, in January 1995, Suar’s first action hero, Nene Carrizo, that charming criminal of Polyladron, He gave his first blows. “Acting is a game: it is making others believe that the fiction they see is real. Checkmate It’s like going back to being that 25-year-old boy who ran in Polyladron. They were my beginnings and I really like coming back from time to time.”
There is one thing that is beyond doubt: Suar never does the ironing. Macerating what is coming, eltrece’s Programming Director points his guns at the theater. That in addition to including the final farewell of Piaf in March (a work he produces with Preludio, in addition to Let’s vote) receives 2024 involved in the production of School of Rockthe musical, alongside Carlos Rottemberg, and another promising bet: Cheers, a comedy directed by Daniel Veronese, at the El Nacional theater, which he will produce and act alongside Griselda Siciliani (his ex-partner), Benjamín Vicuña, Jorgelina Aruzzi and Peto Menahem. The idea, he estimates, would be to raise the curtain around May.
-You are tired of repeating that, as a social fact, cinema is unbeatable. What position do you take in the face of the push and pull between platforms, with the permanence of films on posters becoming increasingly shorter?
-I think that little by little the two ends are becoming friends. The platform is important because it also gives a lot of visibility to cinema, it is a way to enter. In this case, Amazon, which supports Checkmate and makes it possible for us to film it. Theater cinema is a unique, unrepeatable, non-transferable experience. But little by little a mix is being generated between the two formats: respect those five or six weeks in theaters, which is quite a lot, and then go to the platform with the push of having done well on the big screen. With the latest film by Ricardo Darín (Argentina, 1985) step that. She broke it in theaters, then it went to the platform, it did very well and it continued to work in theaters.
Eternal standard-bearer of fiction (he is the artistic producer of the Argentine series envious that Netflix will broadcast and has just finished filming the film I can not live without you, with actress Paz Vega in Spain), Suar confirms that there will be no room for new strips on the eltrece grid in the short term. “In 2024 there will be no fiction. We’ll see later. I want to rethink a little how everything continues, but not fiction this year,” he says bluntly, in a low-light context for telling stories on open TV.
What there is for a while, he warns, will be new projects that involve him as a film director, with the intention of repeating the pleasant experience that his debut film left him, 30 nights with my ex. “It’s a one-way journey and I’ll surely do it again,” she promises.