El Angel

Set in Buenos Aires in 1971, El Angel centres on Carlitos, a teenage boy whose baby-faced good looks conceal a talent for theft and a complete absence of remorse. At his new school he meets Ramón, to whom he is immediately drawn and whose attention he sets out to win. The two fall in together, and what begins as stealing and lying gradually turns into something far more dangerous, with killing becoming part of how Carlitos expresses himself. The story is based on real events.

Luis Ortega directed and co-wrote the film with Sergio Olguín and Rodolfo Palacios. It was produced by Esther García, Agustín Almodóvar and Pedro Almodóvar, and shot in Argentina and Spain on a budget of about 3 million dollars. Lorenzo Ferro plays Carlitos, with Chino Darín as Ramón, Mercedes Morán as Ana María, Daniel Fanego as José, Luis Gnecco as Héctor and Cecilia Roth as Aurora. It occupies the second position in Ortega's directing career, between Damn Summer and Kill the Jockey.

El Angel took roughly 10 million dollars worldwide against its 3 million dollar budget. On TMDB it holds a rating of 7.4 out of 10 from 587 votes, while the critics' rating stands at 6.6 out of 10 from 56 reviews, so audiences rated it somewhat more warmly than critics did.