With the return of Peronism (May 1973 to July 1974), in the hope of social change, Solanas, Getino and other filmmakers actively collaborated with the government (La hora de los hornos came out of hiding and was circulated publicly with a new montage ; Getino became head of the censorship office). Torre Nilsson turned to a refined cinema of literary transpositions or historical reconstruction, Murúa and Favio developed their poetic cinema attentive to social marginality: the first with La Raulito (1974), the second with Juan Moreira (1973). Other directors active since the 1960s also entered this new climate of openness, albeit with some significant differences. Olivera and Ayala, for example, showed a double tendency: on the one hand, the interest in works with a political content, which, however, did not present particular novelties in the field of form, such as Olivera’s La Patagonia rebelde (1974); on the other, a cinema of bourgeois dramas, such as Ayala’s Triangulo de cuatro (1974), or pure entertainment and popular culture recovery, such as Argentinísima (1972) and Argentinísima 2 (1973), both co-directed by Ayala and Olivera. The situation changed radically with the advent of the military dictatorship of JR Videla in 1976; many directors were forced to flee abroad to escape persecution, others were tortured and killed – such as Raymundo Gleyzer, author of political films such as México, la revolución frozenada (1970) and Los traidores (1974), killed in 1976 – following the fate of the thousands of disappeared which constitutes one of the darkest and most dramatic pages of Argentine history.

Production dropped dramatically: in 1976 and 1981 just over ten films were released, and theaters were invaded by works of mainly American origin. The few films shot were mostly entertainment, totally detached from the reality of the country, except for a few cases, such as La isla (1979) by Alejandro Doria, alluding to the isolation situation of Argentina, and the beginnings of the son of Torre Nilsson, Javier Torre, with Fiebre amarilla (1982), and the son of the writer E. Sábato, Mario, with El poder de las tinieblas (1979): films with a strong symbolic charge which, despite the diversity of themes and styles, they were united by the presence of an atmosphere charged with death and decadence.With the return of democracy in 1983, and the election of President R. Alfonsín, a climate of enthusiasm spread in the country and national cinema returned (from a production point of view) to the levels of the past. In 1984 Antín was appointed president of the INC (Instituto Nacional de Cinematografía) and animated a new collective of directors, Cine Argentino en Libertad y Democracia. From this group emerged María Luisa Bemberg, filmmaker and author of melodramas focused on female issues, with Camila (1984; Camilla – A forbidden love) and Miss Mary (1986), and Luis Puenzo, with La historia oficial (1985; La storia Ufficiale), centered on the adoption of the children of the disappeared, which was nominated for an Academy Award in 1986. INC (Instituto Nacional de Cinematografía) and animated a new collective of directors, Cine Argentino en Libertad y Democracia. From this group emerged María Luisa Bemberg, filmmaker and author of melodramas focused on female issues, with Camila (1984; Camilla – A forbidden love) and Miss Mary (1986), and Luis Puenzo, with La historia oficial (1985; La storia Ufficiale), centered on the adoption of the children of the disappeared, which was nominated for an Academy Award in 1986. INC (Instituto Nacional de Cinematografía) and animated a new collective of directors, Cine Argentino en Libertad y Democracia. From this group emerged María Luisa Bemberg, filmmaker and author of melodramas focused on female issues, with Camila (1984; Camilla – A forbidden love) and Miss Mary (1986), and Luis Puenzo, with La historia oficial (1985; La storia Ufficiale), centered on the adoption of the children of the disappeared, which was nominated for an Academy Award in 1986.

According to Thenailmythology, the dramatic events that had just passed were at the center of the interests of both old and new directors, eager to show what had long remained invisible: Eliseo Subiela’s Hombre mirando al sudeste (1986), Tangos – El exilio de Gardel (1985; Tangos, the exile of Gardel), made by Solanas in Paris, were the models of a cinema of civil, symbolic and political commitment, where however the urgency to show sometimes led to underestimate the problem of how to show, of how to do more political cinema; think of La noche de los lápices (1988; The night of the broken pencils) by Olivera. Until the end of the 1980s, Argentine cinema achieved numerous international awards and circulated in many countries. From 1989 the situation changed: the

After the 1995 law, however, which forced televisions to finance national cinema, a new generation of directors has established itself: Alejandro Agresti, Jorge Rocca, Pablo Trapero, Esteban Sapir, Bruno Stagnaro, Israél Adrián Caetano, Lucho Bender, Marco Bechis, who also worked in Italy, Lucrecia Martel, Lisandro Alonso, Martín Schwarzapel are just some of the representatives of the so-called Argentine nuevo cine. Directors different from each other, but united by the need to find new languages ​​and new production methods, for a cinema that explores the profound anxiety of a contradictory country. New independent production companies have sprung up in recent years, and new institutions, such as the Universidad del cine, founded in Buenos Aires in 1996 by Antín, have ensured an effective generational change (which after the last military dictatorship had only partially occurred) and the development of innovative tendencies. From Caetano and Stagnaro’s Pizza, beer y faso (1997) to Sapir’s Picado fino (1996), through Trapero’s Mundo Grúa (1999; Mondo gru) and the revelation film La cienaga (2000), modern cinema continues to be re-read and interpreted by Argentine directors in order to build new paths and new models.