29.05.24, 20:30, La Ciénaga (2001)

Mecha, the matriarch of the family, spends the stiflingly hot summer with her husband and their four children in an idyllic villa on a run-down estate in the mountains of Argentina. Boredom reigns supreme: while the children spend most of the day in bed, the parents steadily fill up on chilled wine by the pool. When Mecha hurts her foot and has to stay in bed, she closes herself off from the energising outside world. Her niece Tali comes to lend a hand to the family. But Tali's arrival brings more chaos than calm and doom hangs menacingly in the air.

This debut film by filmmaker Lucrecia Martel is an ace in Argentine cinema. Guided by the spiritual frustrations of adults and their teenagers, La Cienaga is a poetic yet brutal reflection on sexuality, love, betrayal and racism. The title, meaning 'the swamp', fits perfectly: the family is figuratively stuck in the mud and the film is the unflattering portrait of their own decline.