Clips from Hollywood movies and a cartoon of Johnson as the all-American cowboy reinforce this view. 79 Springtimes is a tribute to Ho Chi Minh, made in 1969, and its title refers to his age at the time of his death. Both are remarkable, the latter being perhaps the most poetic film that Alvarez ever made, constructing and deconstructing images with virtuoso brilliance. Finally, the pieces of the title join up again and, to the music of Bach, bursts of gunfire flash across the screen before another title appears declaring that the Americans will be finally defeated. Alvarez's polemic looks naive today, when it is fashionable to counterbalance aggressive argument with so-called objective truth.
Revolutionaries are out of style.
He was true to his word. Working quickly and with equipment film-makers would now reject as totally inadequate, he made a series of films in the 60s and early 70s that have yet to be beaten either as propaganda, as newsreels or as pieces of brilliantly improvised cinema.