The film focuses on the relationship between judiciary agents Benjamín Espósito (Darín) and Irene Hastings (Villamil) and their investigation into a murder case in 1970s Argentina.

[4] The film marks the fourth feature-length collaboration between Campanella and Darín, after Same Love, Same Rain (1999), Son of the Bride (2001), and Moon of Avellaneda (2004).

In 1999, Espósito tries to make sense of the case and visits Ricardo, who moved in 1975 to an isolated cottage in a rural area of the Buenos Aires Province.

Ricardo loses control when Espósito asks him how he coped with his wife's death and the unfair end of the investigation since Gómez was never seen again after becoming part of Isabel Perón's security detail.

The main events transpire in 1975, a year before the start of Argentina's last civil-military dictatorship (1976–1983); the final year of the presidency of Isabel Perón saw great political turmoil, with both leftist violence and state-sponsored terrorist organization, especially at the hands of the Argentine Anticommunist Alliance (usually known as Triple A or AAA), a far-right death squad founded in 1973 and particularly active under Isabel Perón's rule (1974–1976).

A U.S. supported[8] military coup in 1976 triggered the so-called "Dirty War", which is foreshadowed in the character of Isidoro Gomez and his protection by the government due to his work helping that administration and its judicial system to find (and later kill) left-wing activists and militants or guerrilla members.

[10][11] The state-sponsored terrorism of the military Junta created a climate of violence whose victims were in the thousands and included left-wing activists and militants, intellectuals and artists, trade unionists, high school and college/university students and journalists, as well as Marxists, Peronist guerrillas or alleged sympathizers of both.

[13][14][15] Although in the period there was leftist violence involved,[16][17] mostly by Montoneros,[18] most of the victims were unarmed non-combatants, and the guerrillas were exterminated by 1979, while the dictatorship carried out its crimes until the exit from power.

[25] Since 1983 Argentina has maintained democracy as its ruling system: in that year Raúl Alfonsín was elected president and soon spoke out against the Argentine junta's use of torture and death squads who spirited away "the disappeared" and killed them, hiding their bodies in unknown locations.

These legal elements, popularly known as "the amnesty laws", had effectively blocked the investigation of thousands of cases of human rights abuses committed during the time of the country's last dictatorship.

In 2003 the political climate changed, and during President Nestor Kirchner's administration, the Full Stop and Due Obedience laws, along with the executive pardons, were declared null and void, first by the Congress and then by the Supreme Court.

These changes, promoted by the government in 2005,[27] enabled the judicial power to prosecute and trial all the orchestrators of State-sponsored terrorism, also including politically motivated criminal acts committed between 1975 and 1983.

Frequent collaborator Eduardo Blanco, however, is not featured in the movie; the part of Darín's character's friend is played instead by comedian Guillermo Francella.

[34] In addition to presenting the appropriate ambiance for Argentina in the mid-1970s, it features a formidable technical achievement in creating a continuous five-minute-long shot (designed by visual effects supervisor Rodrigo S. Tomasso), that encompasses an entire stadium during a live football match.

From a standard aerial overview we approach the stadium, dive in, cross the field between the players mid-match and find the protagonist in the crowd, then take a circular move around him and follow him as he shuffles through the stands until he finds the suspect, continuing with a feverish stop-and-go chase on foot through the murky rooms and corridors beneath the stands, finally ending under the lights in the middle of the pitch.

The website's critical consensus is: "Unpredictable and rich with symbolism, this Argentine murder mystery lives up to its Oscar with an engrossing plot, Juan Jose Campanella's assured direction, and mesmerizing performances from its cast.

The remake starred Julia Roberts, Nicole Kidman, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Dean Norris, Michael Kelly, and Alfred Molina.