At the dawn of the 1970s, and with their democratic government inching ever closer to autocracy, members of Uruguay’s Tupamaro Revolutionary Movement — including journalist “Ruso” Huidobro (Alfonso Tort), poet “Nato” Rosencof (Chino Darín, El Angel), and guerilla fighter and future president José “Pepe” Mujica (Antonio de la Torre, The Realm) — knew theirs was becoming a lost cause. But when Pepe and his colleagues are taken hostage by the newly established dictatorship in late 1972, little did they know that they were about to experience a decade-plus test of human endurance. With daily life consisting of brutal isolation in abandoned factories, silos, and underground cells — and an imposed silence intended to drive them mad — each quickly learns to use his wiles, creativity, and cunning to stay alive, remain human, and keep the flickering embers of hope alight in this powerful new film from director Álvaro Brechner, Uruguay’s official Academy Award® submission.

In competition for the CV Cine and FIPRESCI Awards.