Lectures held on Friday 13th November
and advance of special activities for Saturday 14th November

-    El Hombre de al lado in Argentinean competition
-    Los viajes del viento by the Colombian Ciro Guerra
-    Opening of the documentary film Chapadmalal, recuerdos de un país feliz
-    La hora de la siesta in Latin American Competition.
-    Special Activities for Saturday 14th November.
-    More details, photographs, special interviews and other information: www.mardelplatafilmfest.com


* El Hombre de al lado was released in Argentinean Competition.

MAR DEL PLATA, Buenos Aires, Argentina – Friday 13th November, 2009.- El Hombre de al lado, directed by  Mariano Cohn and Gastón Duprat, was released in Argentinean Competition.

This creative duo, last year also took part of Mar del Plata International Film Festival, but with El Artista. Now, in the 24th edition they came with an original film starring Daniel Aráoz and Rafael Spregelburd, filmed in Curuchet House, the only house built by the great Swiss-French architect, Le Corbusier, in America. It is a building located in La Plata City, built between 1949 and 1955, well-known as a world architectural jewel.

In the plot, an industrial designer lives in that house together with his family and a neighbor starts to destroy the wall dividing both houses to build a window that not only threatens the environment of that architectural jewel, but also intimacy.

On that regard, director Gastón Duprat explained: “I’ve had this idea for a long time and it comes from a true story that happened to my brother Andrés (film’s script writer), which we recreated and dressed to make the script. Six years passed for this.

We came from an experience like El Artista, where we worked with non-conventional actors and now, working with professional ones was really good. Particularly, we had been watching Daniel Aráoz for many years and we always thought he was the one for the role of the neighbor. And we had considered Rafael because we knew his work. So, the truth is that it was great working with this duo”, he added.

Regarding the place, the director said: “we thought about Curuchet House because the heresy of that hole in the dividing wall multiplies if it is the only house made by the architect Le Corbusier in America. That was useful to strengthen the conflict”.





As far as he was concerned, Rafael Spregelburd described it as “a pleasure to work with these two directors and with Daniel (Aráoz), as for him, he was the referent in what had to do with the change in TV language, when he performed his characters together with Antonio Gasalla”. “When they proposed it to me I thought it was a luxury from any point of view and I think the duo worked very well in acting” he said.


As far as he was concerned, Daniel Aráoz commented: “although it is very funny, it is a film that talks about violence and you can identify with both characters. It is hard about a reality, but it is described by the directors in a very particular way”.

“That is to say, they put a work of art inside another one. Curuchet House is a work of art and within it they make the film. Cohn and Duprat in El Artista put a look from outside that environment; now they do it from the inside. And they propose a really violent conflict”.
Last, Aráoz considered that “the main characters of El hombre de al lado, both of them, can be his neighbors”.

•    Los viajes del viento by the Colombian Ciro Guerra

For Ciro Guerra, Los viajes del viento’s director, this is the story of a walk, “a journey to the beginning, towards his country spirit” he defined.

Colombia is not only the one that the international news networks show, but also a melting pot of communities with their dreams and utopias. And he adds: “We traveled by train, plane, car and even mule to make this film. We went towards the thing that joined together our white, black and native roots in something unique: our music, coming from there”.







Ciro was born in the region where the film was shot and he grew up in touch with his community and its legends and myths. About the project, the director tried to portray the cultural richness of Colombian Caribbean through the music.

Los hijos del viento is part of the films in Latin American Competition and has as its main character two adorable figures: Ignacio, a juggler who goes on his last tour and Fermín, a young man who wants to learn the secrets of music.

With passages of magic realism, but based on the very Colombian traditions, both artists will go along valleys, savannahs and mountains captured with impressive panoramic photos.

Finally, Guerra invites to a journey that “takes us, together with them, to discover new worlds, new souls, through a universal language: the music.”

* Argentinean Competition documentary film opening -"Chapadmalal”, recuerdos de un país feliz

After seeing and listening to the main characters of Chapadmalal, there are more questions than answers: What happened to you, country?

The desolate landscape of Capadmalal, with its immense buildings, faces a spirited sea and at the same time, hosts a group of old men who go to spend a week on holidays.

Alejandro Montiel, its director, leaves the camera to let it go like a child along the beach, the rooms, the halls so that those old men hold hands with it to tell it tales and stories.

“We worked a lot, it was difficult to make through the month, but we were happy” says one of them and again the question: Who stole them?

There in Chapadmalal, Montiel opens a parallel dimension that allows going and coming back in time through simple and genuine stories. Being 80 years old it will only be possible to live on memories, but today they are still on the fight. They laugh, sing and play as when they where young and some of them visited Chapadmalal to see the sea and a city like Mar del Plata, which was the dominant classes’ privilege, for the first time.

For the director, “Chapadmalal is dignity, respect, attentive listening and conversation. Silence, the wise people form the tribe are speaking.”