Lucrecia Martel’s feature debut takes place over a few sweltering summer days on the outskirts of a provincial town in northwestern Argentina—the place where the filmmaker herself grew up. The opening scene sets the tone: a listless, bored group of people sits beside the murky swimming pool of a country house that has seen better days, drinking too much. When the lady of the house drunkenly falls onto a glass and badly cuts herself, at first no one lifts a finger.
Through a series of seemingly random incidents, shot with a handheld camera and interspersed with snatches of casually overheard dialogue, the film enters the world as experienced by the children and adults in the family. Casual racism and the discontent of a middle class sunk in apathy seep into their interactions. The oppressive atmosphere, with the rumble of a summer storm in the distance, creates a sense of diffuse menace.
In a 2022 poll, an overwhelming majority of Argentine film professionals voted La Ciénaga the greatest Argentine film of all time.
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