Lila
2016 · 16m · Argentina
Directed by Sebastian Dietsch
Genres: comedy, family, sports
Deportivo Canchilegua plays the final of a regional football championship, having been unbeaten until now. The team waits for Lila, its small lucky-charm dog, who has not arrived before the match ends.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
A sports movie where the actual sport becomes almost irrelevant—that's either clever subversion or a swing and a miss, and Dietsch's commitment to treating a dog's absence as genuine tragedy puts it in stranger territory than most would dare.
The film positions itself squarely in the tradition of Latin American magical-realist comedy, though the execution leans toward whimsy rather than the formal precision that would elevate it beyond regional festival charm.
The entire film hinges on the decision to play the team's mounting anxiety with deadpan sincerity rather than cuteness—that tonal discipline, holding the absurdity at arm's length, is what makes the waiting genuinely funny instead of just precious.