It is considered by critics as the film who started the New Argentine Cinema, or NCA (Nuevo Cine Argentino), an aesthetic movement representing a fundamental break with the Argentine cinema of the late 1980s and early 1990s, by introducing new narrative elements and a strong realistic style.

In the course of a few days, his obsession with finding a suitable motorcycle to steal leads to a series of interconnected events between several people with apparently nothing in common.

The director/producer Martín Rejtman used a minimalist style in making this film.

Pablo Suárez, a film critic for the Buenos Aires Herald and a member of FIPRESCI Argentina said, "[Rapado, his] first feature demonstrated that another type of cinema was possible in Argentina, one capable of pushing boundaries.

Rapado was an absolute oasis in a land plagued by films with agonizing narratives, with neither depth nor genuine inspiration, and yet still subsidized by a State [through the National Institute of Cinema and Audiovisual Arts (INCAA); also referred to as the Argentine National Film Board - an autharquic agency which is part of the Argentine Government and is dedicated to financing film projects] in favor of the status quo.