This Thursday, February 29, premiered on Max (formerly HBO Max) Menem Junior: the death of the president’s son. This is the first official Argentine production of the renewed streaming platform.
In four episodes of 45 minutes each, the documentary recounts the death of Carlos Saúl Facundo Menem Yoma, the son of former president Carlos Menem. By interleaving the testimonies of the protagonists with the dramatization of events and archive images, the series not only achieves a complete narrative, but also manages to capture the essence of an era of Argentine politics.
“Menem Junior: Death of the President’s Son” is now available on Max. The documentary opens with images of Ramallo, province of Buenos Aires, the place where the tragedy occurred which shocked the country and the world. In first person, the workers of the field where the “Carlitos” helicopter crashed tell how they experienced that March 15, 1995, while showing us a dramatization of the accident, to make the narration of the events easier.
The tension generated by the images of the accident is attenuated once the introduction of the series appears, which with archive images, a dramatic musical curtain and the voice-overs of the protagonists, anticipates a little what we will see during the course of the series. ‘episode. four episodes.
“Carlos Facundo Menem, son of the president of Argentina, has died” is the first thing you hear during the opening credits, while covers of various newspapers of the time appear, in which the news appeared on the front page.
The documentary features dramatizations of the story’s climactic moments, to speed up the narrative.Automatically later we see several moments of Menem’s presidency, which distance him from the father figure, showing him more like the political animal he was. “We have come to install a new style in national political life,” says the former president in one of the first archive images that the series presents to us.
Menem: from family man to political animal
The interesting thing about this series is this does not limit itself to recounting the tragic helicopter accident of Carlos Menem Jr.but it also leads the viewer to reflect on the relationship Carlos Menem had with his family as opposed to his relationship with his political life.
“What tribute can this president pay to his son? Work,” says Menem during his first national broadcast, after the death of his son. From then on the documentary stops showing him as a father moved by the loss of a son, and begins to underline how He used the tragedy to win the electionthree months later.
After a brief dramatization of his son’s agony in hospital, showing the devastated former president saying goodbye to his son, Menem’s character changes 180 degrees.
The official poster for “Menem Junior: Death of the President’s Son”, the series now available on Max.Several journalists, including Facundo Pastor and Chiche Gelblung, tell what Menem’s political, media and eccentric side was like, and how he used his son’s death as a tool to gain re-election.
Accident or attack?
As seen in the first previews, The series seeks to reveal whether Carlos Menem Junior’s death was an accidentas established by justice, or it was a murder to send a message to the former president.
Zulema Yoma and Zulemita Menem, two of the central narrators of the new documentary.The hypothesis of the attack is introduced from the first chapter of the series, just as happened in real life, by Zulema Yomathe mother of “Carlitos”.
The first thing they show about her is a real interview with Mirtha Legrand, in which, at the host’s request, she confesses that her mother never wanted her to marry Menem. “My mother told me ‘you will be the most cursed woman on Earth,'” says the president’s ex-wife.
They even show with real images the moment in which Menem evicted his wife from Olivos, after a harsh argument.
“They were murdered,” Zulema says in archive images of a press conference months after her son’s death. “I know they killed my son. In the field of politics the interests are very great,” he continues to say in his first public statements, supporting the attack theory.
“27 years have passed and I think the time has come to tell the truth”, is the closing sentence of the first chapter, during Zulema’s first appearances, in the present, telling his version. And this is what leaves the viewer wanting more: the need for the enigma posed to be solved.
The helicopter commanded by the ex-president’s son, after crashing into high voltage cables. The four episodes of Menem Junior: the death of the president’s son anda are available in max.
Source: Clarin
