The Student

Santiago Mitre's first film follows Roque, who starts university in Buenos Aires. He has no interest in classes; following a girl he joins one of the political groups on campus and quickly learns how that world works. The subject is not the student movement but politics itself. Gathering votes, forming alliances, freezing someone out and deciding who will sign a statement are all shown in detail. The university functions here as a scale model of national politics. Roque believes in nothing ideologically, and the film does not present that as a flaw; it is what makes him good at this. The telling is fast, handheld and dense with dialogue. Mitre became one of the best-known directors in Argentine cinema in the years that followed. Who it's for: those who like films about political mechanics and Argentine independent cinema. Who it's not for: viewers looking for a sympathetic protagonist; the film defends nobody.