Las Acacias

Those in need of a flab-free winter warmer should look no further than this hushed romance that takes place in the cramped confines of a cantankerous trucker’s cab. Rubén (Germán de Silva) has agreed to allow a local woman, Jacinta (Hebe Duarte), to ride shotgun as he hauls logs from a Uruguayan backwater to Buenos Aires. That she brings along her obscenely cute newborn initially raises hackles – there’s barely a word uttered in the first 30 minutes – but as they amble on down the road and the baby gurgles and ogles adoringly, the nervy pair begin to let down their guards. Delicately paced and deceptively slight, director Pablo Giorgelli (winner of the Camera d’Or for a debut film at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival) generates sweet truth and sexual tension by keeping the style clean, acting tight and edits sparse. The will they/won’t they climax is a tad trite, but it’s a superficial nick on the façade of the film’s overall loveliness.