Screaming into the Abyss: Trauma and Witnessing in Albertina Carri's Los rubios and La rabia

Albertina Carri, one of the most distinguished directors to have emerged on the contemporary film scene in Argentina, is perhaps equally renowned for being the daughter of left-wing intellectual militants who were disappeared during the dictatorship of 1976-83, when Carri was just three years old. This chapter presents a comparative analysis of two of Carri’s films, her debut autobiographical documentary, Los rubios (2003), and her dark tale of rural and domestic violence, La rabia (2008). Focusing in particular on how each film represents trauma and its intergenerational transmission, the chapter demonstrates how placing these films in dialogue with one another offers original insights into Carri’s overall political and artistic project. Drawing on Gerhardt’s (2004) interdisciplinary research on early emotional development and Lury’s (2010) work on the screening of children in war films, I make the case that the director’s personal/political project that began with Los rubios reaches its full artistic expression in La rabia: that is, to give voice and witness to the traumatised child who has no agency or means to speak other than her own creative ability.