A Common Crime

Persephone is released from prison after three years. Returning to the neighborhood will present him with a new hell. Without a job, she gets the help of Juana who shelters her in her house and with whom she looks for some changa to survive.

During the military dictatorship of Argentina in 1977, office clerk Francisco Sanctis, his wife and children lead a quiet life in Bueno Aires. But one day an old friend calls him after 20 years, asking him to sign something. When they meet, she explains that she actually wants him to warn two of her friends that are about to be kidnapped by the army, and Francisco must decide if he wants to risk everything for two strangers.

Marlene lives in the house of the old woman she takes care of. When her friend disappears, she escapes every night to investigate. The clues lead her to night jobs in which she meets other women who, like her, have developed their gifts into superpowers.

In shades of gray, the calm, static shots show young female visitors to a public hospital in Argentina. This is the place where teenage girls have to make a decision about the new life growing inside them. A few of them have, at a very young age indeed, already had children. For others, the idea of a future as a mother is new and terrifying. In many cases, though, having an abortion isn’t a decision to be taken for granted. Some of the girls have learned from childhood that getting pregnant is your own fault, and you have to accept the consequences. What they know about abortion comes from horror stories of clandestine practices in backstreet clinics. The hospital gynecologists and other staff, who can be heard but not seen, ask the girls about their well-being, their relationship, their family ties, and how they see the future—with or without a child. In these intimate and non-judgmental conversations, the girls respond with powerful candor in their most vulnerable moments.

Mara, a young speleologist, lives with her father Horacio, a rural veterinarian. Both emigrated to Italy from Argentina decades ago. Horacio makes one last trip, curing animals in the mountains, before dying. Mara, some time after her departure, meets Roy, a Dominican boy who arrives in town seeking asylum. They become friends. She helps him speak Italian and teaches him about the caves. Together, they take an excursion inside a cave. There Mara will meet her dead father and they will talk about what they never talked about before. Film about close ties, identity, uprooting and the force of nature.

Adolfo, 60 years old, soon to retire, has the only chance to do something important in his life. He works as a public employee in a forgotten agency: Department of Paranormal Intelligence. After a mysterious accident: some children disappear in the river without any trace of their bodies. He, who has not solved a case in 15 years, is sent to Victoria.