Los Cabos: Argentina’s Rizoma, Director Mariano Hueter Team on Bank Heist Series ’67 Millions’
Rizoma Films, the prolific Argentine film company run by Hernan Musaluppi and Natacha Cervi, has partnered with young writer-director Mariano Hueter to develop bank heist TV series project “67 Millions.”
Inspired by true events, TV fiction plot turns on Chavez, a renowned Argentine public prosecutor who tries to solve the most shocking robbery in Argentina’s criminal history, the audacious assault in 2006 of a bank branch in the city of San Isidro, in Buenos Aires province.
“The Theft of the Century,” as it was popularly known in Argentina, was executed in just two hours by five assailants who took some twenty hostages as part of a staged event. While pretending to negotiate with the police, they looted 143 security boxes and fled through a tunnel they had dug for a year, which led to a storm drain.
In a race against time and power, Chavez and his assistant Gauna will be plunged into multiple conflicts as they discover the criminals have connections with justice and police departments and the government and control the mechanisms of a corrupt society. Every step towards the truth endangers their lives and those of the people around them.
Designed as a 13-episode season, TV skein “will be made with a production structure which has to do more with a film treatment than with that of a TV program,” said producer Natacha Cervi.
“67 Millions” was pitched at the 5th Los Cabos Intl. Film Festival, opting for its Gabriel Figueroa TV Development Award.
“This is a very original series, though faithful to cop and suspense genres. The episodes are well written and frame a powerful crime story plus several subplots that make the series rich in details,” Cervi said.
“67 Millions” marks an early foray into TV fiction production by Rizoma, the Buenos Aires-based shingle that Musaluppi and Cervi created in 2001, at the dawn of the New Argentine Cinema.
A multi-laurelled indie company, Rizoma has produced some 30 feature films, ranging from festivals triumphs such as Adrian Biniez’s Berlin Jury Grand Prix winner “Giant” and “Whisky,” from Juan Pablo Rebella and Pablo Stoll, which took Cannes Un Certain Regard award in 2004, to accessible arthouse (Juan Taratuto’s “It’s Not You, It’s Me”) to feature debuts by young talent -Victoria Galardi’s “Lovely Loneliness,” Federico Veiroj’s “Acne,” Gustavo Taretto’s “Medianeras.”
Mariano Hueter’s first TV fiction venture was thriller TV mini-series “Inconsciente Colectivo,” aired by Argentine pubcaster Television Publica. Produced by Hueter’s outfit Idealismo Contenidos, the mini-series was selected to form part of The Wit’s prestige Fresh TV Fiction showcase at Cannes’ Mipcom trade fair in 2013.
“Mariano Hueter has a great future and talent. That’s why, in addition to the ’67 Millions’ project, we are developing with him further proposals, including his first feature film, provisionally titled “Los culpables,” now at writing stage,” Cervi said.
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