ABSTRACT
Argentinian cinema has offered a modest but solid contribution to the corpus of world science fiction films. The total number of Argentinian science fiction films produced since the release of what is arguably the founding example of the genre, Invasión (Invasion, dir. Hugo Santiago, 1969), has been relatively small. However, most of these films have sought to engage seriously with the genre in a cultural context in which this type of film has been mostly neglected. The fact that Jorge Luis Borges-one of the most renowned Hispanic writers globally-was one of the screenwriters of Invasión set the tone for what was to come: an approach to science fiction based on philosophical and political speculation rather than lowbrow exploitation. A lack of financial resources and an industry with little development of visual effects and CGI technologies are not the only elements that explain the aesthetics of Argentinian science fiction. In a country that has for the most part not supported scientific research, and in which the benefits of technology reach only a small part of the population, other versions of the genre may not be embraced by local audiences (for a general discussion on this topic see Paz 2008). Joanna Page (2012) rightly mentions
space,tim e,anddystopiaingustavom
osquera
p y
p g
q
that Argentinian science fiction cinema has tended to rely on retrofuturistic aesthetics or parodic approaches to the genre in order to address the issue of credibility. However, the two films made by Gustavo Mosquera R. would be an exception to this rule. Both Lo que vendrá (Times to Come, 1988) and Moebius (1996) belong to the tradition that privileges speculation and fantasy rather than futuristic societies or spectacular technologies. However, despite these two films being mostly successful in critical terms, and well received both nationally and internationally at the time of their release, they have now been largely forgotten by the public. They have not been released on DVD and, particularly in the case of the first film, mostly neglected by academic criticism. Although more has been written in relation to Moebius, there are no papers that offer a comparative discussion of the two.
