HACIA UN CUARTO CINE: VIOLENCIA, MARGINALIDAD, MEMORIA Y NUEVOS ESCENARIOS GLOBALES EN VENTIÚN PELÍCULAS LATINOAMERICANAS\ud \ud

Contemporary Latin American cinema features a series of realist portraits and testimonies, in which young filmmakers develop their own visions of the new conditions of life on the continent. This dissertation looks at these specific cinematic visions of beings who survive on the edges of marginality and violence.\ud The dissertation is articulated specifically along topics representing critical approaches to \ud movies produced in Argentina, Colombia, Brazil, Peru, Bolivia, Chile and Mexico. The works of a new generation of filmmakers including Alejandro González Iñárritu, Lucrecia Martel, Israel Adrián Caetano, Carlos Reygadas and Fernando Meirelles uncover a series of erosions of the social composition of the countries where these directors live. In addition, their films —as lucid and contradictory cultural artifacts representing a new era that is characterized by easier access to technology— tell us about the expansion and development of neoliberalism in Latin America starting in the late 1980’s and the harmful consequences of this economic model.\ud Chapters One and Two analyze the conditions of marginality and violence in Latin American cities represented by movies such as Amores Perros, Ciudad de Dios and Pizza, Birra, Faso. Experiences of social exclusion and poverty reflect aspects of life in the new century in one of the most conflictive regions of the world.\ud Chapter Three is specifically devoted to restoring and maintaining the memory of the bloody years of the Southern Cone military dictatorships, in the 1970’s and 1980’s, during which thousands of people disappeared and national tragedies occurred, as dictators claimed they were carrying out a frontal assault on Communism.\ud Chapter Four approaches new global scenarios, including films like Batalla en el cielo, El aura and El secreto de sus ojos. In these movies a perspective of negotiation and exchange of subjectivities is presented, influenced by some European master filmmakers (Antonioni, Bergman, Tarkovsky).\ud This dissertation argues that contemporary Latin American cinema is gaining prestige and has become an art to which the academic field looks with interest and enthusiasm. It confirms the possibility of experimental art without boundaries, one that raises crucial questions.\ud \ud \ud \ud \ud \ud \u