Luis Puenzo, director of Argentina’s first Oscar-winning feature, dies at 80

Argentine director and screenwriter Luis Puenzo, who won the country’s first Oscar with dictatorship-tackling feature La historia oficial, died on Tuesday at the age of 80.

Puenzo directed the film, which won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1986. His death came just a day after the passing of another emblem of Argentina’s cultural scene, Luis Brandoni.

The news was confirmed by the Argentores industry site, which said: “With deep sorrow, we bid farewell to the outstanding screenwriter, director, producer and member of our organisation, Luis Puenzo, who passed away today in the City of Buenos Aires at the age of 80. From Argentores, we extend our condolences to his family, friends and colleagues at this difficult time.”

The Sociedad General de Autores also confirmed Puenzo’s passing. The director had been out of the public eye for some time with unspecified health problems.

Born in Buenos Aires on February 19, 1946, Puenzo began his professional career in advertising in the 1960s. He later founded his own production company, Luis Puenzo Cine, where he made short films and commercials that helped him develop his narrative style before moving into feature filmmaking.

He made his debut as a director and screenwriter in 1973 with Luces de mis zapatos, a children’s film starring Norman Briski. He later co-directed the segment ‘Cinco años de vida’ in the collective film Las sorpresas.

Global fame

International recognition came in 1985 with the release of La historia oficial, which he directed and co-wrote with Aída Bortnik. The film tackled the appropriation of children during Argentina’s 1976-1983 military dictatorship.

The feature won multiple awards, most notably the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 1986 – the first Academy Award for Argentine cinema. At the same ceremony, Puenzo and Bortnik were also nominated for Best Original Screenplay.

The film, which starred Héctor Alterio and Norma Aleandro, was also honoured at the Cannes Film Festival, won the Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film and received the Silver Condor from the Argentine Film Critics Association.

Puenzo won the Oscar on March 24 – an iconic date in Argentina as it marks the beginning of the 1976 coup d'état, something the director emphasised when receiving the statuette at the awards ceremony in the United States.

"As I stand here on this stage accepting this honour, I cannot help but recall that on another March 24th, 10 years ago today, we suffered the last military coup in our country. We will never forget that nightmare," he said.

Other films

After La historia oficial, Puenzo continued his career with films including Old Gringo (“Gringo viejo”), an adaptation of the novel by Carlos Fuentes, starring Jane Fonda, Gregory Peck and Jimmy Smits, set during the Mexican Revolution; The Plague (“La peste”), based on the novel by Albert Camus and starring William Hurt, Robert Duvall and Raúl Juliá; and La puta y la ballena, shot between Argentina and Spain and starring Leonardo Sbaraglia and Aitana Sánchez-Gijón.

Beyond his work as a filmmaker, Puenzo played an active role in shaping Argentina’s audiovisual policy. 

In 1994, he contributed to the drafting of the National Film Law (Law No. 24,377), which established the autonomy and funding structure of the Instituto Nacional de Cine y Artes Audiovisuales (INCAA), giving a major boost to film production.

Puenzo was also a founding member of the Academia de las Artes y Ciencias Cinematográficas de la Argentina in 2004. 

Between late 2019 and April 2022, he served as president of the INCAA.

– TIMES/NA