Tempo, al ritmo de la inestabilidad
2019 · 18m · Argentina
Directed by Jonathan Rodríguez Serrato
Genres: coming-of-age, drama
Tones: contemplative, tender
Santiago, a young designer and guitar lover who must find rent money before the day ends, loses the loan he was counting on and, tired of fleeing his landlady, decides to take control of the rhythm of his life.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
The premise reads like every broke-millennial-finds-meaning story, but Rodríguez Serrato's actual move—collapsing the distinction between Santiago's interior panic and the rhythm of his day itself—is genuinely weird enough to sting.
A formally deliberate meditation on precarity and agency that positions itself thoughtfully within the Latin American coming-of-age tradition; the film knows what it's doing with structure, and that restraint is its argument.
The magic lives in how Rodríguez Serrato uses music and editing tempo to externalize Santiago's decision-making moment—one specific sonic/rhythmic choice that transforms a financial crisis into something about reclaiming control that you *feel* rather than hear explained.