El Eternauta´s Wife
1h 21m
Directed by Adan Aliaga • Documentary • With Elsa Sánchez de Oesterheld, Francisco Solano López, Daniel Rafecas, Jorge Oesterheld, Juan Sasturain • 2011 • 82 minutes
It has been fifty years since the adventures of Juan Salvo were first published in the science fiction comic El Eternauta. Some time in 1957, Argentine writer Héctor Germán Oesterheld created a highly metaphorical and political graphic novel. El Eternauta introduced a new way of understanding comic strips: it transcended the limits of mere escapism to become an adult and politically committed story. To this day, the comic book continues to surprise thousands of readers and artists all over the world. El Eternauta´s Wife follows Elsa Sánchez, Oesterheld’s widow. The daughter of immigrants from Galicia, her life is evidence of the cruelty of Argentina’s repressive dictatorship, which took the lives of her husband, their four daughters and their respective husbands. The presence of Oesterheld’s political inclinations in his work, which included a severe criticism against the social and political situation in Argentina, was the perfect excuse to start this story of brutality. El Eternauta´s Wife is the story of a fight for survival in the mist of horror; A vital and close account where Elsa Sánchez shares her memories with the courage of real heroes; An example of a pacific fight against injustice and a testimony where pain and love for life went hand in hand until her passing, on June 22, 2015.
“The splendid El Eternauta's Wife showed how it is possible to talk about victims from Argentinian dictatorship without falling in victimhood, while claiming the mythical Argentinian comic El Eternauta as a great symbol of resistance against terror.” —Eulalia Iglesias, CAHIERS DU CINEMA SPAIN