Plot
The episodes in the life of a Jewish family in the Once neighborhood of Buenos Aires and the other shopkeepers in a low-rent commercial gallery are depicted in the story.
The narrator, Ariel Makaroff (Daniel Hendler), is the son of Sonia Makaroff (Adriana Aizemberg) who was deserted by her husband (Jorge D'Elía) when he went to Israel in 1973 to fight in the Yom Kippur War. Yet, the father is in touch with Sonia via telephone weekly and supports Ariel and his brother Joseph (Sergio Boris). Sonia runs a lingerie shop in the gallery.
Ariel is a young man in a hurry without much of a sense of direction. He's having an affair with Rita (Silvina Bosco), an older woman, pines for his former girlfriend Estella (Melina Petriella), and fantasizes of emigrating to Poland, where his family came from during World War II.
He carps at his grandmother (Rosita Londner) for immigration documents that will support his claim to Polish citizenship as he wants to become "European." This forces his grandmother to remember her memories of Holocaust Poland.
At one point, the shop owners organize a race against another group of merchants. They hope to earn a cash purse and fix up the exterior of their gallery and install air conditioning.
Other characters include: a large Italian family whose noisy arguments drown out the radios in their radio repair shop; a quiet Korean couple who run a feng shui boutique; Mitelman (Diego Korol) who runs a travel agency, but which is really a front for currency smuggling; and a solitary stationer named Osvaldo (Isaac Fajm).
Right before the big race his father suddenly shows up in Buenos Aires. His mother confesses to Ariel that his father left Argentina and the family because she had a brief affair with Osvaldo, the retailer next door. It was a one time thing and did not mean anything but it ruined the marriage. Ariel finally gets to hear his father's side of the story: he could not get over the fact that his mother had betrayed him with Osvaldo. Elías can finally enfold his son in a long-overdue embrace, and Ariel embraces his father as well in the closing moments of the film.
The grandmother sings a klezmer song over the closing credits.
Read more about this topic: Lost Embrace (film)
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