“There will never again be another tango couple like us,” says María Nieves, best known for her long-standing partnership with Juan Carlos Copes.
You’ll never have heard of the pair of them if you’re not interested in tango, but Our Last Tango (aka Un Tango Más), German Kral’s film about them, works just fine whether you’re a newbie or an aficionado of these Argentinian dancing giants, largely thanks to its emotional core.
“If I could do it all again, I’d do it all the same. Everything… except being with Juan,” says María at one point. At just shy of 80 when this was made in 2015, she’s about to hang up her shoes and looking back on a life that began in poverty but all changed the moment, aged around 14, she first danced with Copes, three years older.
It’s rags-to-riches stuff. She danced in her work clothes. They danced because it was “the joy of the poor”. When the popularity of tango in dancehalls began to wane, Copes, inspired by Gene Kelly, re-invented the dance, turning it into a stage show that brought the couple fame and a lot of money, especially once they ended up on Broadway.
You can pick these bones out of this many-headed film built – to Nieves’s evident annoyance – around the relationship between Nieves and Copes. They fell in love, they married, he played around, they split as a couple but carried on dancing together. The hurt she felt, she says, made her a better dancer. Eventually, having danced since the 1940s, in 1997 they split up professionally as well. She, we divine from the many interviews with her (he is less forthcoming), never stopped loving him.
The film’s strength and its weakness comes from its approach. There are bits of interview with Nieves and Copes, classic talking head stuff. There are documentary moments of him teaching formally, and of her watching other dancers and giving them tips (stand closer, look into her eyes). Nicotine-hued dramatic reconstruction featuring Ayelén Álvarez Miño and Juan Malizia as the younger Nieves and Copes (later, Alejandra Gutty and Pablo Verón take on the roles). Nieves talking to the modern dancers about what it was like back when she started.

Then there is slightly more meta stuff featuring the dancers playing Nieves and Copes discussing what it’s like to be dancing in the shoes of these greats. Pulling further back still there is footage of Miño and Malizia teaching other dancers. While it is still good, at this point it becomes clear that Elvis has left the building and it becomes obvious that Kral is ringing the changes because there isn’t enough good archive footage of Nieves and Copes to flesh out a feature-length film.
But what he does have is dynamite, and it really helps that the dancers playing the younger Nieves and Copes are no lightweights either.
The throughline is the damaged personal relationship and the dancing style Copes and Nieves perfected together, him slow her fast. “She was the greatest,” says Copes baldly, no further discussion necessary.
Late on we see them both dancing as they are now. Not together but with younger partners – he a touch stiff, she wobbling a bit on her ridiculously high heels. The core of their talent is still there, though time is nibbling at the edges. It is touching, particularly, watching Nieves getting a standing ovation for her performance in front of a large audience. When Copes comes on stage and hugs her the effect is massively emotional.
Was the applause out of pity, Nieves wonders aloud a bit later. She is in some respects a romantic, an emotional woman, but she’s also clear-eyed enough to realise that she’s 80 and, living alone, is about to let go of the rope that’s guided her since she was a teenager. This is ultimately a sad film, about dancing and love. Its message, if it has one, keep dancing… but don’t let it break your heart.
Our Last Tango aka Un Tango Más – Watch it/buy it at Amazon
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© Steve Morrissey 2024