Brief Heaven


Brief Heaven is a 1969 Argentine film directed by David José Kohon. It was entered into the 6th Moscow International Film Festival where Ana María Picchio won the award for Best Actress.
In a survey of the The 100 [Greatest Films of Argentine Cinema|100 greatest films of Argentine cinema] carried out by the Museo del Cine Pablo Ducrós Hicken in 2000, the film reached the 24th position. In a new version of the survey organized in 2022 by the specialized magazines La vida útil, Taipei and La tierra quema, presented at the Mar del Plata International Film Festival, the film reached the 41st position.

Plot

A young middle-class man and a young girl who has left the slums to work as a prostitute meet by chance on the Plaza de los Ingleses, opposite the emblematic Retiro station in Buenos Aires. Their encounter lasts no more than a day and morning, an enchanted lapse of time that echoes the title Brief Heaven. Kohon’s beautiful but sad film draws the picture of the nascent change in a generation’s mentality, while also asserting a new way of filming. The streets and promenades of Buenos Aires offer a welcome to the characters but also play a clearly aesthetic role, as for example, in the remarkable tracking shot that moves through the underground gallery near the Obelisk to the echoing notes of Piazzolla’s bandoneon. Roger Koza

Cast