The Argentine/Uruguayan coproduction of Patron [The Landowner] is the feature-length directorial debut of Jorge Rocca, who served as Subiela's production manager on El lado oscuro del corazon. Moody and experimental, it tells the absorbing tale of the domineering Antenor (Uruguayan stage actor Walter Reyno), who wins the young, lovely Paula (Valentina Bassi) in a knife fight and bullies her into bearing him a son. "Without official help it is impossible to make films in Latin America," Rocca told an interviewer for the International Forum of Young Cinema section, where the film premiered in Berlin, "but it was an even greater problem to find distribution, to get the film to the public." Filmed entirely on location in Uruguay in velvety black and white and as defiantly uncompromising as its subject, Patron is a difficult yet impressive debut that has already been seen at the Puerto Rico and Montreal festivals, with more such invitations sure to follow.