Acting

Lucila Balzaretti

Born 1920-08-21 · Zürich, Switzerland

Lucila Balzaretti (registered at birth as Lucila Balzaretti Openzeller, also known as Lucila Alarcón; Zurich, Switzerland, August 21, 1920 - Puntarenas, Costa Rica, February 13, 2012) was a Swiss actress and journalist. She participated in the theater group La Linterna Mágica under the direction of Ignacio Retes. She ventured into journalism by writing a film column in the newspaper El Popular and in the magazine México al día, where José Revueltas and other writers also collaborated. In 1942, while preparing a report on the play El inspector, then directed by Seki Sano, she met Ignacio Retes, whom she married two years later. In 1946 she participated in the founding of La Linterna Mágica and made her debut as an actress in the play Mariana Pineda (1946) under the pseudonym of Lucila Alarcón. Shortly after, she acted in Los zorros (1946), Israel (1948) and Santa Juana (1948), all directed by Retes himself. Later she left her stage name to continue appearing as Lucila Balzaretti in the plays El aria de la locura (1953), Terminal (Bus stop), Una ciudad para vivir (1954), La feria distante (1955), A media luz los tres (1957) and Nacida ayer (1958), among others. She also had a brief participation in one of the revivals of A Streetcar Named Desire, a Seki Sano version. She was the mother of film director Gabriel Retes, with whom she participated in the films Chin Chin el teporocho, El bulto, Flores de Papel, Arresto domiciliario.

Acting credits

Broken Flag poster
6.9

When a group of young filmmakers witness and film a crime of passion, the most outrageous blackmail of the century begins. By means of a fantastic plan, the filmmakers send to the murderer, a financial and industrial big shot, a copy of the movie that incriminates him and they demand him an improvement of the standard of living for the working class.

Broken Flag

1979

Bienvenido-Welcome poster
6.2

During a business trip, a married man (José) has an affair with a blonde who leaves him the message "Welcome to the world of AIDS". Later, his wife Maria, unaware of the situation, makes love to her husband when he is drunk. The consequences of the contagion are devastating. José and María find the support of a group of filmmakers who decide to make a film of their story.

Bienvenido-Welcome

1995

New World poster
5.7

Towards the end of the 16th century, the Spanish conquerors living in the New World faced a serious problem: the evangelization of the indigenous people, who did not understand or accept Christianity due to their unshakable faith in their own religion. The court of the Inquisition cracks down on heretics and the natives prepare for a general uprising ...

New World

1978

Coup at Daybreak poster
6.8

The film follows the events of the night of February 4, 1992 in Caracas, Venezuela. That night a group of military rebels staged a coup d'etat. Venezuelans found themselves as virtual prisoners. As the coup starts and fighting takes place from a military base which is in the center of the city's most affluent areas, with both luxury high rises and palatial mansions. The area of La Carlota provides a wealth of very interesting, often flamboyant and typical characters of the Latin America upper middle and upper classes. They are among the most affected. Various vignettes in these different characters' homes are developed. These people's reactions, lifestyles, vices, and humanity come out in a very honest fashion under duress.

Coup at Daybreak

1998

The Hard Years poster
6.7

Three boys, after participating in the events of 1968 in Mexico, find themselves in the need to get away from the social struggle

The Hard Years

1973

House Arrest poster
5.0

Because of a millionaire fraud, a man is condemned to house arrest, and the only place where he can serve sentence is his mother’s house, affected with Alzheimer disease. The arrival of the man disrupts the life of the people who live with the elder woman. With turns of the screw, the story feels dramatic, but it also contains certain amount of irony. It talks about human and family relations with a total absence of violence.

House Arrest

2008

Sucesos distantes poster
6.3

One couple (Carlos & Irene) are having troubles, because he suspects that Irene's hiding something about her past in Russia. To make things worst her ex-husband goes to Mexico and tells Carlos that her other ex-husband also is going to claim her as his property.

Sucesos distantes

1996

Wild Women poster
5.1

Women escape from prison to search for a treasure whose location has been revealed to them by a dying old woman.

Wild Women

1984

El bulto poster
6.7

After being in a comma for 20 year, Lauro wakes up in a very different Mexico than the one he lived on. Ideas, hopes, ways-of-life and customs have changed, and Mexicans of the nineties are strangers for a man sleeping since 1971. Lauro will have to deal with the changes brought by the History, and will have to accept that the future is never as we imagined it when we were young.

El bulto

1992

Chin Chin el teporocho poster
6.1

Rogelio’s story, a young man of humble origin in the neighborhood of Tepito, who falls in love with the daughter of a wealthy grocer, Michelle, but his marriage to her will be a failure and he will end up as a one more drunk.

Chin Chin el teporocho

1976

Cuartelazo poster
6.3

Narration of one of the bloodiest episodes of the Mexican national history, The Tragic Ten, beginning when General Victoriano Huerta sent to kill President Francisco I. Madero, Vice President José María Pino Suárez and Senator Belisario Dominguez. The film recreates the moment of the execution at the hands of Huerta and his accomplices Bernardo Reyes, Félix Díaz and Manuel Mondragón.

Cuartelazo

1977

Katuwira, donde nacen y mueren los sueños poster
5.8

Sofia meets a stranger man who hacks the computer system where she works before she has an accident. After the accident, she is the only one that remember seeing this man, so she decides to search for him.

Katuwira, donde nacen y mueren los sueños

1996

El Reventón poster
5.8

Wild-partying hippie-artist-dilettantes end up forming a revolutionary terrorist cell. The misfit Gato loses a lot of money in bets and his father throws him out of his house. Ál leaves his girlfriend Laura for his lover, the married Adriana. Out of money Gato and Ál becomes urban guerrilla when they plan to kidnap Gato's rich father.

El Reventón

1977

No artwork available
4.2

No synopsis available yet.

El asesinato

1997

Paper Flowers poster
4.6

On the thinnest of pretexts, a horde of homeless people descend on the apartments of two members of the comfortable middle class and proceed to loot and vandalize both homes, leaving the next morning with many of the belongings they found there, as well as one of the residents who has opted to join them. This political allegory is based on two plays by the Chilean playwright Egon Wolff.

Paper Flowers

1978

Tribulaciones en el seno de una familia burguesa poster
6.3

No synopsis available yet.

Tribulaciones en el seno de una familia burguesa

1973

Los años duros: El nacimiento de un guerrillero poster
6.3

The lives of Rolo, Chino and Boby take different courses since the student movement of the 60’s. Some years later, the friends meet again. Rolo has turned into a guerrilla fighter, Boby into a businessman and Chino into an embittered and solitary man.

Los años duros: El nacimiento de un guerrillero

1989