Lucía Torres Minoldo

The life of Juan José Gorasurreta is pierced by images. In his new feature film, the historic film society programmer appropriates the films that made him in order to find new relationships and patterns and thus generate a convergence between his personal life, that of Argentina and that of cinema. In The Absences his travels coexist with Orson Welles, activism, Fernando Birrri, the Cordobazo, his studies, Eva Landeck, family, Carlos Echeverría, the Trelew Massacre, Nagisa Ōshima, censorship, film societies, the Malvinas war, his short films. The randomness of this list vanishes as the film progresses, and gives way to a synapse that is as logical as it is moving. “It is a portrait on how Argentine history and my encounter with films designed my sensitive areas” —as he did with his own story, no one could define The Absences better than Gorasurreta himself.

Emma and her father spend a few days in an isolated collection of huts in the Argentinian mountains. It is here that they meet Elda, a solitary figure, who will guide them through the world of pagan beliefs and local legend.

Maria lives with her mother in a village in the interior of the country. She does the housework and works as a masseur in a room in the house. The mother is in a bad way because of an injury caused by Suncho, the dog in the house, and then Maria takes care of her demands. Florence, her younger sister, is moving to the capital with her boyfriend. The early arrival of the couple in the village, to finalize details of the move, triggers movements inside the house.

Martín, a Qom shepherd, narrates an old myth about how the earth and the sky used to be upside-down and connected by a tree.

Those who rebel against authority figures disobey. This film echoes “Cordobazo” — a popular rebellion in Cordoba against the Argentine military dictatorship in 1969 — through the story of Alicia, a trolleybus driver who joins an insurrection against an oppressive regime.

Two working-class young men dream of making it big with their cuarteto band. One night they get caught up in a crime they didn't commit. Knowing that their origin condemns them in advance, they flee with no other option.

Throughout Córdoba, Argentina, there is a wave of looting, and the police are taking several young people. In the midst of this hectic period, teenage Juliana becomes pregnant by her boyfriend, Lautaro. Juliana wants to have an abortion, but she is afraid to do it with pills and they do not have money to pay for an intervention.

A newly divorced father and his son, spent a last vacation in their mountain house before it goes to sale.