The Hour of the Furnaces is a 1968 Argentine film directed by Octavio Getino and Fernando Solanas. 'The paradigm of revolutionary activist cinema', it addresses the politics of the 'Third worldist' films and Latin-American manifesto of the late 1960s. It is a key part of the 'Third Cinema', a movement that emerged in Latin America around the same time as the film's release. The work is a four-hour trilogy, divided into chapters and united by the theme of dependency and liberation. The first part - "Neo-Colonialism and Violence" - is conceived for diffusion in all types of circuits, and is the one presented at Cannes Classics.

Plot

In 1965, Fernando Solanas and Octavio Getino began collaborating on a documentary film that would serve as a witness to Argentina's reality. They began gathering archival material – newsreels – and testimony from Peronist Resistance fighters, intellectuals, and university leaders. The filmmakers' quest took them all throughout the nation, as evidenced by the subtitle of the film: 'Notes and Testimonies on Neocolonialism, Violence, and Liberation.