WATCHING AN ARGENTINIAN FILM IN ARGENTINA

RELATOS SALVAJES

"So many argentinian films watched already in so many years..., but the experience today has been a new one: before and after the film,  the audience was speaking  the same way as the characters into the screen!"

La desigualdad, la injusticia y la exigencia del mundo en que vivimos producen que muchas personas se estresen o se depriman. Algunas explotan. Esta es la película sobre ellos. Vulnerables ante una realidad que súbitamente se altera y se torna impredecible, los protagonistas de Relatos Salvajes cruzan la delgada frontera que divide a la civilización de la barbarie. Una traición amorosa, el retorno de un pasado reprimido, o la violencia contenida en un detalle cotidiano, se presentan para impulsarlos al vértigo de perder los estribos, al innegable placer de perder el control.

CALLE LAVALLE, THE STREET OF CINEMAS

Calle Lavalle; the street of cinemas; the reflection of a society; historical centre of Buenos Aires.

Calle Lavalle is a typical street in the centre of Buenos Aires: a cocktail of shopping, gastronomy, and tourism.

When the sun rises, the street wakes up to thousands of people who cross it, and while some are in a hurry, others are just looking for cheap purchases. In the shop windows, you can find anything and everything: from football shirts imported from China, to mugs representing Pope Francis, or a corkscrew with Mafalda’s face. Daydreamers are constantly interrupted by some person handing leaflets trying to sell a tango show, a guided tour or the best exchange rate in the city. The street is lively and filled with restaurants, cafés and little shops but when the sun goes down, it is another face of Lavalle that we discover. Although the red lights of the Bingo never cease to shine, darkness seizes the street as it becomes nobody’s land. The restaurants empty their bins and, almost immediately, a few people come to scavenge the trash to feed their families. What are the secrets of this street?

It was called “La Calle de los Cines” or “The Street of Cinemas”. If you look close enough, you will notice that its floor is filled with engravings: many grey marble slabs are camouflaged in the ground, erased by time and countless footsteps. One of them reads “Luxor: 1920-1993” as it points out the existence of an old cinema. Are these the relics of a glorious past?  It is quite difficult to imagine that two centuries ago this street was called Merino and it was merely made of dust. A few single-storey houses made of adobe welcomed the first inhabitants of Buenos Aires. The street witnessed the passing of history: soldiers, lovers and dreamers. At the beginning of the twentieth century, Lavalle was filled with cafés, cabarets and brothels for the lonely souls of the time.