Paper short abstract:

This paper focuses on the figure of the adolescent and young adult slacker and its portrayal in New Argentine Cinema. I will explore how this type of character might be useful to understand some of the narratives produced during the worst economic and social crisis in modern Argentine history.

Paper long abstract:

This paper focuses on the figure of the adolescent and young adult slacker and its portrayal in New Argentine Cinema. I will explore how this type of character - made famous cinematically by Richard Linklater in the film aptly name Slacker - with all its aura of stasis and laziness, might be useful to understand some of the narratives produced during the worst economic and social crisis in modern Argentine history. My main arguments will be focused on the [middle] class-inflected nature of this figure, an interesting counterpart to the many marginal and working class characters that populate this cinematography. For matters of space I will base my analysis in the films of Martín Rejtman, Raúl Perrone, and Ezequiel Acuña, although the paper's ultimate aim is to put New Argentine Cinema in dialogue with other cinematographies, both in Latin America and the rest of the world, thus suggesting a possible reading of Argentine cinema in [global] context.