After many years writing novels and scripting for television, Lucía Puenzo announced her arrival as a major new directing talent back with the international critical success XXY (winner of Best New Director Award, EIFF 2007) – the psychological study of a young girl with genital ambiguity whose burgeoning sexuality forces a decision. If anything, Puenzo's sophomore effort is more audacious and ambitious. An impressive genre-juggling Chabrolian thriller with much to say about Argentina’s outdated class system, state corruption, and South American politics, El niño pez tells the story of Lala (Inés Efron, so impressive as the lead in XXY), the rich daughter of an influential Buenos Aires judge who is in love with her Guayi (Mariela Vitale) – the family's Paraguayan maid. Lala plans to escape to Guayi’s home town on the shores of Lake Ypoá, back in Paraguay; but their best laid plans spiral out of control when Guayi is arrested for a crime she did not commit… Based on Puenzo’s own novel, published in 2004, the film has seen many changes from the original work (the book is narrated by a dog, which might have proved too much even for this talented filmmaker), and it’s a mark of her growing confidence and skill in this medium that she manages to bring the disparate genre elements together as a single, coherent whole … not to mention the fractured narrative structure, which has derailed many more experienced practitioners. It’s little surprise that after years as a writer, Puenzo should eventually move into directing for the cinema. Her father is Luis Puenzo, Oscar®-winning director of The Official Story (1985), and they have worked together before – he as producer on both her features and she as writer on his 2004 feature The Whore and the Whale. The title, incidentally, refers to the legend of The Fish Child, an aquatic infant who guides the drowned to the bottom of the lake.

Screening with:

Fuera de Control

• Sophía Carrillo /
• Mexico /
• 2008 /
• 11 mins

An absolutely stunning stop motion animation from Mexico, with beguiling shades of the Brothers Quay. In a labyrinthine house, lonely little creatures seek to connect with one another…

Director: Sophía Carrillo
Producers: Carolina Cárdenas, Sofía Carrillo
Scriptwriter: Sophia Carrillo
Editor: Uri Espinosa Cueto
DoP: Paola Chaurand
Sound Production: Gerardo Martínez
Music: Saúl Ledesma