'La Cienage' (The Swamp) an award winning Argentine, Spanish, and French film directed by Lucrecia Martel will be screened at 3.00 pm on Tuesday, June 24 and at 6.30 pm on Wednesday June 25 at Alliance Francaise, Barnes Place Colombo-7.

Set in the high plains of northwestern Argentina, the film portrays the life of a self-pitying Argentine bourgeois family. The film tells the story of Mecha (Graciela Borges), a middle aged woman in her 50's who has several teenagers. Her husband Gregorio (Martín Adjemián) wants to remain looking young. Both have to deal with their gloomy Amerindian servants, who Mecha accuses of theft and laziness.

Both take to drinking to cope with day to day living. The family spends their summers in their rural shabby country home the name "La Mandragora" in order to avoid the hot and humid weather of the city.

Mecha's cousin, Tali (Mercedes Morán), lives in the nearby city of La Ciénaga (The Swamp, in English) and has a brood of small, yet, noisy children and a husband, Rafael (Daniel Valenzuela), who loves his family and also hunts.

Before long, the crowded domestic situation in both homes strains the families' nerves, exposing repressed family mysteries, and tensions that threaten to erupt into violence. Discussing the issues of crumbling marriages, sibling relationships and eccentric families, the film won a screenwriting award at the 1999 Sundance Film Festival.