‘Homo Argentum’: smiles and laughter. Also a huge Francella. What more could you ask for? | Cinema: premieres and reviews

There are sublime actors and actresses, who encourage you to pay the ticket for the pleasure they give you when watching and listening to them. And the reproach of certain viewers when they accuse them of always playing the same character can fall into the grotesque. I mean, that’s them. They look, talk, listen, gesture, move in the same way every time the camera focuses on them.

And there are also others, endowed with versatility and talent, with a miraculous ability to get under the skin and into the hearts of a very diverse typology of people in the same film. For the common joy of the public and the people who direct them. Everyone has their favorites among these chameleons. I have been fascinated, among others, by the Englishmen Peter Sellers and Alec Guinness or the Italian Ugo Tognazzi, masters of transformation. The admirable Argentine actor Guillermo Francella dedicates himself to these multiple creations in The Silver Man No less than 16 motley gentlemen in as many stories governed by corrosion, surreal and Dadaist situations, bad shit, pity (yes, there is some among the generalized satire), the arrogant or hypocritical behavior of established people who play with the humiliation of the weak dressed in a charitable costume.

Even if there were no credits, it would be easy to recognize the authorship of this film by two gentlemen named Gastón Duprat and Mariano Cohn. The movies I’ve seen of them (The illustrious citizen, Official Competition) and the series (The manager, Fine arts, Nothing) They have transparent signs of identity. All favorable. To begin with, they make me laugh and smile, two priceless sensations. They have brilliant ideas, they handle first-class irony and sarcasm, they are unpredictable in the development of their ideas, they extract comedy by portraying imposture and farce, they denounce petty behaviors that try to hide words and appearances, they demonstrate that absurdity and paradox are a notable part of existence. They do it with vitriolic intelligence.

No wonder he has raised hives among many of his compatriots. It usually happens with satires that hit the target. But their disbelief would be just as annoying and fearsome when talking about other societies, other countries.

They choose to mix short stories with more developed ones. And they are unequal. They can provoke a semi-bitter smile, astonishment, some laughter and complicity, unless you feel portrayed in one of the miseries they describe. They carry the always identifiable seal of the house. Although it also makes you remember that excellent Argentine film that told several stories titled wild stories, by Damián Szifron. And Guillermo Francella? Well, overcoming such a complicated challenge of making so many diverse people credible, funny, pathetic or hateful. It is sometimes difficult to recognize him behind so many hairpieces and wigs, such different gestures, voices and tones. I imagine that her work and the permanent makeup she had to undergo must have been exhausting, but it was worth it.

How good Argentine interpreters are when they are authentic. I think of Federico Luppi, of Ricardo Darín, of Norma Aleandro, of Héctor Alterio, of Francella, of people like that. And what a joy that there are directors like Duprat and Cohn, who permanently challenge the conventions, the dogmas of culture. woke, the avant-garde of papier-mâché. They say that The Silver Man He has pissed off the Kirchnerists. I also think about the movie they could make about a character like Milei. Laughter would be guaranteed. And probably, incidentally, fear.