Few titles from this year’s Cannes were a bigger surprise than The Delinquents, a three-hour-plus Argentinian crime comedy with existentialist leanings. Word from the festival was largely outstanding, critics finding Rodrigo Moreno’s treatment of the heist subgenre entirely fresh when such seems impossible. Ahead of its October 18 release from MUBI, a trailer has arrived.
As Rory O’Connor said in our review, “In each of those lives the film’s central question about the nature and cost of freedom is finely sketched out. The men Morán encounters in prison enjoy a freedom of time and thought that is alien to him at first; while in Córdoba, both men discover a freedom beyond the reach of their urban, consumerist lives. The money, of course, promises another kind of freedom entirely. These ideas are drip-fed over The Delinquents‘ leisurely runtime, and thanks to Moreno’s patient, wistful approach, there is no shortage of time for them to germinate. The nearly dialogue-free opening, when Morán commits his white-collar sin, is given almost 20 minutes alone. Román’s hike to the hiding place, where he first encounters Norma and gets caught in the rain, is longer still. (There is also a lengthy section with a film team that I suspect could’ve been cut.) Shot by Alejo Maglio with some lovely crossfades and rather effective screen wipes, the film luxuriates in the area’s rugged landscape and convincingly makes its case without cheap sentiment––on more than one occasion I began to question some of my own life choices.”
Find the preview below:
Morán (Daniel Eliás) is a bank employee in Buenos Aires who dreams up a risky plan to liberate himself and his co-worker Román (Esteban Bigliardi) from the shackles of working life: Morán will steal enough cash from the bank to fund their retirement if Román hides the money for him after he confesses and serves prison time; in three years’ time, they’ll reunite, split the cash, and never have to work again. Departing to the countryside to fulfill his side of the deal, the less adventurous Román finds himself transformed by Morán’s idyllic vision of economic liberation far from the rigors of urban life. But what is the true cost of freedom? From writer-director Rodrigo Moreno (A Mysterious World) comes an existential probe into the work-life balance and what happens when it’s shattered and replaced with something radical and new. Combining sumptuous imagery and dry humor, Moreno finds universality and complexity in the eternal dilemma of forging our livelihood.