Announcing 120 beats per minute, in the heartbreaking thriller of Nauel Perez Biscayart

In a suddenly sunken Uruguayan village, an employee / boss (El Empleado y El Patron, VO) puts two social classes in opposition because of a conflict that revives a small agricultural owner and one of his employees on a soybean farm. A terrible tragedy will upset the fragile balance of this working relationship where the ascendant will always have the last and terrible word.

Between Western and Thriller, this film by Manuel Nieto paints a violent portrait of a peasant world that is increasingly vulnerable but, despite the difficulties, aspires to greater freedom. Nahuel Perez Biscayart, announcing 120 beats per minute, offers a dark and counter-intuitive performance against the moving young Christian Borges. Presented at the last Cannes Film Festival, a two-week director / employee / patron of directors is coming out today.

AlloCiné: The film is built on the relationship between this employee and this boss, who could have been friends, their social conditions, and a terrible accident had it not been for the obstruction. Was the script always conceived that way if you reworked it according to the shooting?

Manuel Nieto: Yes, the script was changed before filming, because after we shot the first part of the film, we realized that the film, as we imagined it, was too big for what we could afford and time was wasted. . We cut a third of the script, 60 sequences, and obviously what was in it had to be entered into the script again, but in a compressed form.

Then, when we shot the next two parts, we kept what we shot, because you should know that the day of shooting is very expensive, it was $ 20,000 for this film, and I’m a producer, so I have to shoot. Note (laughs). Ultimately, I believe that these modifications that we made to the script – this tightening – allowed the film to create greater tension from the moment of the accident.

Admittedly, this tension turns the movie into a thriller and sometimes even a western, in the sequence of a very dreamy horse race. What was your inspiration in terms of staging?

Manuel Nieto: I understand what you are saying. Inspiration, I would say this is my personal adventure, especially during filming. This is attending a horse race, organizing a wild boar hunt, delivering the whole team and all the equipment to a remote corner, this is the logistical part. And for the film, I see it as a big picture that goes from one place to another, showing a region that is very wide and that we are going to cover looking back. It gives people what they will never see. I believe that it was this desire that inspired the staging.

Nahuel, you will find the French Society in Cannes in this new film in a totally different register after 120 beats per minute. Did the filming go well? What did you like about this movie?

Nouel Perez Biscayart: It was a three-part shoot, I participated in the first and the bottom. It went very well, it was liquid and quiet. It was wonderful to return to the source of cinematic creativity with a small handmade film. The script was very strong for me and I really wanted, after shooting a film in Belarus, which was very big and commercial, to move on to something smaller, a human height film. I knew Manuel’s work, so I went for it.

Did you talk to Manuel about the script changes? Has your character undergone any changes?

Nouel Perez Biscayart: No, Manuel is very specific, he also teaches and was accurate with his script. I gave him my full confidence. Every time something changed, he would send me notes and I would follow the movement. I totally agree with him, the film has gained strength thanks to this condensation, which is somewhat imposed by financial constraints.

In the end, the character was pretty bright from the start. I somehow see the film as a long scene that unfolds throughout the distance, you just have to get into a certain situation and this story moves you as organically as possible. What has mostly changed are the dramatic bets.

What were the big changes that resulted?

Manuel Nieto: There were a lot of small scenes from the boss world that were not important, but it was possible to build an idea put together. The multiplication of these scenes eased the tension. There were still some interesting dialogues, so I had to distill them into the main scenes.

The boss confronts an employee who is obsessed with horse racing. It was obvious to call a non-professional actor, Christian BorgesWho is impressive against Nauel?

Manuel Nieto: Yes, it was a fundamental idea that was the materialization of two worlds. Starting from the world of bosses and having professional actors and coming into the world of staff and having non-professional actors in the region where we filmed.

Christian Borges was also excellent with horses because he is a horse trainer who has never ridden. But he was not accustomed to racing, so he had some practice. He is very young, very smart and has watched a lot of Nauel. He watched everything on the set.

Nahuel Perez Biscayart: Christian was a very attentive and very capable person on the set. He learned quickly, he was not afraid to go there. At the end of the filming, he asked me if I was thinking of taking steps to play telenovela in Argentina. He asked me for contacts. I loved working with him, he was very approachable, very open, very observant. He very quickly understood the logic of making a film. I was very excited.

Megan Shockett’s interview on July 10, 2021 in Cannes.