Imagining Argentina

Release date:September 12, 2003

Directed by:Christopher Hampton

Rated:

Runtime:107 minutes

Imagining Argentina is a 2003 film directed and written by Christopher Hampton. The movie was nominated for the "Golden Lion" award at the 2003 Venice Film Festival. The film is adapted from an award-winning novel of the same title by Lawrence Thornton. The movie is set during the Dirty War in... 1970s Buenos Aires, Argentina, where the military government is abducting those opposed to its rule. Cecilia, a dissident journalist, is kidnapped by the secret police to join the ranks of the 'disappeared'. Cecilia had earlier published a provocative article in her outrage over the disappearance of students protesting bus fares. As her husband Carlos, a theatre director, begins to search frantically for her, he realizes that he has acquired psychic power that enables him to predict the future. This not only puts him in high demand by those who have also lost a loved one, it helps Carlos to foresee what happens to his wife and other detainees. At one point, Carlos visits the Naval Mechanics School, the notorious torture centre. The movie has graphic images of suffering such as the rape and torture scenes of Cecilia and her daughter Teresa.
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Fiction is the form of any narrative or informative work that deals, in part or in whole, with information or events that are not factual, but... rather, imaginary—that is, invented by the author. Although fiction describes a major branch of literary work, it may also refer to theatrical, cinematic or musical work. Fiction contrasts with non-fiction, which deals exclusively with factual events, descriptions, observations, etc. . Realistic fiction, although untrue, could actually happen. Some events, people, and places may even be real. This is termed "faction". It can be possible that in the future imagined events could physically happen. For example, Jules Verne's novel From The Earth To The Moon, which at that time was just a product of his rich imagination, was proven possible in 1969, when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin set foot on the Moon, and the team returned safely to Earth. Realistic fiction strives to make the reader feel as if they're reading something that is actually happening—something that though not real, is described in a believable way that helps the reader make a picture as if it were an actual event.
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