Latin Noir

The 1970s were a dark decade in the history of Latin America. Coups d’état multiplied, crimes proliferated, military juntas spread terror. It was in this context that a new literary genre was born: the “Latin noir”.

While authoritarianism was eating away at Latin America, a new generation of Hispanic writers seized on the noir novel genre and turned it into a weapon of protest. Much more than a simple polar, the “novela negra” is a social mirror that points finger at the dictatorship, prevailing corruption and criminality. We go to meet the great authors of the genre, in five cities: Leonardo Padura (Havana), Paco Ignacio Taibo II (Mexico City), Santiago Roncagliolo (Lima), Guillaume Orsi and Claudia Pineiro (Buenos Aires). Their work testifies to the necessary and inextricable link between fiction and reality.

This film is a crossing of Latin America and its tumultuous history, deciphered by specialists. Past and present resonate, through the intermingling of archival images and recent shots, equally poignant. The noir novel guides us and unfolds its precious story around memory and resistance.