Mar del Plata: “Just like here!” exclaimed an anonymous spectator, and the hall of the auditorium was already completely dark, while on the screen was seen an institutional space prepared by Italian public organizations that support that country’s cinematic production and strengthen its presence in the world. The complaint was accompanied by some lukewarm comments until someone in a critical tone was heard explicitly mentioning the president. Javier Miley. There, complaints increased, with some opposing voices and some supportive voices managing to silence the most critical. At that moment the movie started and no one spoke again.
The incident occurred on Friday morning, during the first screening of the festival (and international competition) of the Italian film Geoia On screen. A few hours have passed since the opening ceremony which also added a new contribution from the public to the political discussions that have taken place in recent years in Argentina: from some boos to the local mayor Guillermo Montenegro when his presence at the event was noted for the dedication. Christina Kirchner (Distributed between applause and questions) From the verb Marilena Ross When he received the Lifetime Achievement Award. Also at several screenings over the weekend, whistles were heard as the festival’s official venue appeared on screen with this year’s slogan: “Awesomeness Reborn.”
The first distinctive sign of this year’s festival was that postcard: the coexistence of two opposing ideological viewpoints that did not cross the threshold of these short and loud demonstrations. This is the second time that the exhibition has been organized under the management of an organization (National Institute of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, INCA) that, like few others, expressed the essence of the millist discourse in terms of the “cultural battle”, applied a very strong edit and implemented measures that were highly questioned by a large part of the audiovisual community. “This government considers Argentine cinema an enemy,” is one of the most heard phrases uttered by the director in recent times. Mariano LinasPresent at some of the Mar del Plata debates about the present and future of Argentine cinema in these festival days.
Political divisions still remain, especially from the active movement of the Fuera de Campo group (formerly Contracampo), which brought together again through a program of Argentine cinema with a very high attendance (with screenings held at the Enrique Carreras Theater), and a wide audience of audio-visual creators, students and cinephiles identified with the previous artistic management of the festival, which was replaced by the current one by the Inca authorities.
But at the same time, the festival found a way to establish friendly coexistence between those who think differently, which was embodied in the presence of figures closely associated with Kirchnerism such as Röss O. Cristina Banegasthe hero of the series Hey, Which was presented this weekend at the festival with big screen screenings before its premiere in Netflix A stunning promotional stand was installed in the Hall of Chambers located in the Paseo Aldre Shopping Centre, one of the largest spaces of the Mar del Plata Festival.
In addition to this, the strategic integration of the Government of Buenos Aires into the festival. Axel KiselovWhich provided the hall stage free of charge for activities (last year this process was paid) and participated in the opening with key cultural figures of the Council of Ministers.
What remains up in the air, with all this seemingly resolved, is the festival’s search for the audience lost during the wide-ranging period of transition that has been the last two editions. This year, for example, the healthy decision was made to centralize all parallel activities in one central location.
But the full and visible commitment of the city itself to the festival is not yet on the horizon, as in 2024. One official institutional website explicitly declares that the film fair (which reached its 40th edition this year) finally belongs to the local identity. There it is said: “Marplatense, this festival is for you.”
However, in the most strategic and visible places in Mar del Plata, the presence of the festival is not seen with posters, signs or visual campaigns that gain immediate recognition. The only clearly visible sign close to the activity center remains on the promenade in the wide dry plaza that separates the twin buildings of the regional hotel and the casino. It has remained there since it was used at the opening ceremony to access the auditorium stage, but almost unnoticed because a few meters away, a massive fence keeps much of the space closed off as part of redesign work on Mar del Plata’s central promenade.
Jorge Stamadianos, one of the festival’s artistic directors, told LA NACION on Sunday that he was “very satisfied” with the first interim credit. However, without attendance figures, he highlighted the invitation to several events and spoke above all about the success of some parallel activities and how satisfied the main international guests who have arrived so far have felt: Americans Bill Condon and Tonatioh, director and star, respectively, spider woman kiss, Italian actor Saul Nanni and Spanish actress (of Basque origin) Itziar Itunio.
Meanwhile, Mar del Plata continues to search for the missing viewer. There is no shortage of this curious audience eager for new things that characterize great festivals. At the same time, the most popular titles from a wide and diverse programming, but still lacking a fully defined profile, find a response among the people. There was great applause at the end of some films that reflected this broad expressive palette.
However, it is still far from that huge flow that gathers at all hours in front of theaters and sells out entire shows one after another. LA NACION confirmed during its tour that there were a lot of free seats at some shows that would have been left without seats at other times. Some titles scheduled at marginal times went unnoticed.
The best moment of the weekend was in the final performance on Sunday. At midnight, at the conclusion of the magnificent show, the practically full hall (about 1,000 seats) applauded enthusiastically for the Argentinean premiere of “The Movie”. New waveRichard Linklater’s film is undoubtedly the jewel of this year’s festival programming.
Perhaps the desire of the new trend is to recover that spectator who in the past was accustomed to going to the cinema frequently and encountering world cinemas or high-quality cinema with different degrees of artistic demand, more friendly or more serious. It is the public that abandoned this habit en masse due to the pandemic, and when life returned to normal, it did not return again, and it is difficult for the old motivation to return. In this sense, live streaming platforms have done their job.
Elsewhere, the younger, more curious and film-loving viewer, who sympathized with this festival until 2023 and did not do so with the current model, affirmed his support for Fuera de Campo as a space of encounter and recognition. At several showings of the Argentine Premier Film Series scheduled this year at the Enrique Carreras Theater, that small room was packed to capacity. To see CurrentsBy Milagros Momenthaler and Pin by fartyby Alejo Mogilansky, for example, there were lines that were a block and a half long. The same happened with some classics presented by the festival’s former artistic director, Fernando Martín Peña.
This spirit extended to a series of open and very complex discussions held over the weekend, as in 2024, in a downtown library, also within this alternative space. On Sunday morning, the most interesting conversation began around the question: How do films with this perspective attract viewers?
Sharing the table with director Cecilia Kang and screenwriter and essayist Fran Guerrero, Lynas was forceful: “Quantitative reasoning is useless. Only producers care about numbers.” He even considered applying this numerical perspective to… Homo argentum “It went badly” because despite the publicity and spread that the film received, it did not reach two million tickets sold.
“It’s time to start again,” added the director of Extraordinary Stories after recalling the failure of the system in place in Argentine cinema over the past 20 years that guarantees incentives for the work of technicians and, above all, 100% financing for producers even before the film’s premiere. In this logic, the one who loses is the director, and there doesn’t seem to be much interest in creating audiences.
From this standpoint, a question was raised that everyone asks after the influence that the most independent, radical and daring Argentine cinema has in local or international festivals, and that call is not repeated when the same films are able to appear. “Cinema, in its essence and by definition, is a popular reality, it is directly related to emotions. Failure or indifference on the part of the audience should not be romanticized,” it was heard during the talk. In Mar del Plata, they both continue searching for the missing viewer.
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