This films is nothing more than a piece of political propaganda in which a group of Irish filmmakers, without much knowledge of the crumbling political and social situation in Venezuela since the election of Hugo Chavez as president of the country, take a one sided view of the problem, showing only what the government wanted them to show. In fact they where guided by the government, filming only what was permitted to them by Chavez's supporters and not caring about the other side, the side of those who oppose Chavez. I think it's irresponsible to make a documentary and show only one side of the events in any kind of historical confrontation. This film reminds me of "I Am Cuba" (1964) by Mikheil Kalatozishvili, a documentary praising the Cuban revolution and the Castro Regime, as some kind of romantic crusade to save the poor from the evil rich people... Go ask the Cubans today, forty years later what they feel about the revolution. But "I Am Cuba" in spite of his naive ideological propaganda had many great visuals, some of them totally stunning. Those visuals make the film unforgettable. Sadly "Chavez: Inside The coup" doesn't have great camera work or otherwise. it's totally forgettable, but very dangerous, because when you show this film to people not very well informed about the real Venezuelan situation and the events surrounding the coup, it's a real piece of misinformation. You can almost believe Chavez is a real Messiah for the Venezuelan people, nothing farther from the truth. One last point to make: it's almost impossible to get close to Hugo Chavez with a camera, so I don't believe that the private conversations recorded by the filmmakers of Chavez And his Staff, where casual. Everything in this movie was approved by the government of Venezuela and many parts seem to have been staged to make this undoubtedly charismatic Latin American leader seem like a real nice chap, who is just trying to do good for the poor people.
