La Ciénaga

2001 1h 41m ES

👍

6.8

SOLID

★6.8TMDB · 176

Drama

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

Amid the sweltering summer heat in northern Argentina, two middle-class families retreat to a crumbling country estate and a modest townhouse, where strained relationships, simmering tensions, and the presence of children and servants quietly expose the fractures of family life. Between idle days, gossip, and unspoken desires, the boundaries of class, tradition, and faith are reflected in their everyday interactions.

“Some stories are better left unspoiled.”

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Cast

Mercedes Morán
Tali
Graciela Borges
Mecha
Martín Adjemián
Gregorio
Leonora Balcarce
Verónica
Silvia Baylé
Mercedes
Sofia Bertolotto
Momi
Juan Cruz Bordeu
José
Noelia Bravo Herrera
Agustina

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Lucrecia Martel
Writers: Lucrecia Martel
Languages: Spanish
Countries: Argentina, France, Spain

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 6

ERA

Did you know

25 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 6

WORLD

Did you know

International production across 3 countries: Argentina, France, Spain.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 6

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Lucrecia Martel, shot by Hugo Colace. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 6

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor Santiago Ricci shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 6

CAST

Did you know

Mercedes Morán and Graciela Borges and Martín Adjemián carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 6

WILD

Did you know

IMDB entry: tt0240419 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Lucrecia Martel directs. Hugo Colace behind the camera. Santiago Ricci cuts. Produced in Argentina, France, Spain. Dialogue in Spanish.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

125 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.
2International production across 3 countries: Argentina, France, Spain.
3Directed by Lucrecia Martel, shot by Hugo Colace. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
4Editor Santiago Ricci shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
5Mercedes Morán and Graciela Borges and Martín Adjemián carry the top of the cast.
6IMDB entry: tt0240419 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
7Classified under 10 themes, including "argentina", "racism", "summer", "drunk".

The technical file

Cinematography: Hugo Colace
Editing: Santiago Ricci
Production design: Graciela Oderigo
Makeup / hair: Marisa Amenta
Sound: Hervé Guyader
Runtime: 101 min · 1h 41m
Status: Released
Box office: $103,215
Original language: ES
Certification (US): R
IMDB: La Ciénaga (2001)

Also by

Lucrecia Martel

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

Community reviews

What people are saying

CinemaSerf2026-04-03
You know that expression about incest being a game for all the family? Well they don’t quite get to that stage here, but they do come pretty close! “Gregorio” (Martín Adjelmián) and wife “Mecha” (Graciela Borges) are hosting their and their friend's eclectic family at their ramshackle Argentinian country house. With a storm brewing in the near-by highlands, they sit by a pool that could easily be the home of scores of piranha fish, sipping red wine whilst their young son and and his pals play in the woods with a real shotgun and it’s very own ciénaga (swamp). It is hard to tell who might actually be sober, or responsible for the goings on until “Mecha” has an accident and needs to be taken to hospital - via an hydrangea bush. What now ensues is quite a messy and oddly ineffective observation of two families at their most dysfunctionally (ab)normal. There are few boundaries for anyone, hormones are left unfettered, tempers flare and the plot goes precisely nowhere. That’s perhaps my problem with all of this. None of these people are remotely likeable. It is like watching an ensemble of the most selfish and spoilt people auteur Lucrecia Martel could conjure from her imagination and then see them engage in bouts of self-indulgent introspection without any of it having any purpose - for them or us. What we do get, though, is a sense of community from the two families that mingle together - both as bad as the other, but neither actually evil or even slightly aware of the excesses of their behaviour. On that front, the acting plaudits must also be shared with Mercedes Morán (Tali) as the female characters dominate this drama leaving scant dialogue for any of the men and only a soupçon of token eye-candy from Juan Cruz Bordeu’s “Josë” - a man whose relationship with his mother stops only just shy of breast feeding! The production design is really quite effective here with the grubbiness of their settings and their dilapidated motor cars selling us a story of a family whose wealth has dwindled from what it might have once been; of a sense of faux decadence and of a framework for an existence that cannot last for much longer. There is a great deal of dialogue and though there is a little comedy contained therein, for the most part it’s fairly relentless as it vacillates from the melodramatic to the plain dramatic. Perhaps I just wasn’t in the mood, but I think every film needs at least one role that the viewer can associate with, and this had none at all for me, sorry.

Production companies