Selby identifies 31 noirs from Argentina; there are certainly more than that. It appears that the earliest such film is SE ABRE EL ABISMO aka DESCENT INTO HELL (1944), directed by Pierre Chenal during his sojourn in South America during WWII. It appears that he was one of the catalysts for the efflorescence of noir in Argentina that took hold immediately after WWII and continued into the late 50s. Chenal returned to Argentina in at the end of the 40s when his return to France ran up against a hostile critical reception, though the idea to film NATIVE SON was hatched in the months prior to his return to Buenos Aires.
Woolrich had a following in Argentina, and appears to have been admired by highbrow authors such as Jorge Luis Borges and Adolfo Bioy Casares, the latter of whom would take up screenwriting in the 1960s, both original scripts and adaptations of his (and other writers') novels.
Leon Klimovsky, who directed EL PENDIENTE, began his film career as a writer, and his first screenplay was Chenal's SE ABRE EL ABISMO.
Responses