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THE HEIST OF THE CENTURY

EL ROBO DEL SIGLO

By Ariel WINOGRAD

ANCORE PICTURES - as DISTR Theatrical, TV, DVD-video, VOD, CHINA

Action/Adventure - Completed 2020

In 2006, a group of thieves performed what is considered one of the most famous and smart bank heists in the history of Argentina. How they robbed the Rio bank is as surprising as what happened afterwards. This is their story.

- Year of production
- 2020
- Genres
- Action/Adventure, Comedy
- Countries
- ARGENTINA
- Languages
- SPANISH-ARGENTINE
- Duration
- 114 mn
- Director(s)
- Ariel WINOGRAD
- Writer(s)
- Alex ZITO, Fernando ARAUJO
- Cast
- Guillermo FRANCELLA, Peretti DIEGO, Luis LUQUE, Pablo RAGO, Rafael FERRO, Mariano ARGENTO
- Producer(s)
- Paula ZITO (AZ Films S.A.), Fernando SZEW (MarVista Entertainment), Axel KUTCHEVASKY (Viacom International Studios), Alex ZITO (AZ Films S.A.)
- Synopsis
- It's pouring outside and the streets of this well-to-do Buenos Aires suburb are deserted. Araujo has sought shelter beneath the awning of a closed shop. In one of the enormous puddles that has formed on the avenue, Araujo catches the warped reflection of a lit sign. Looking up, he sees the Banco Río building.
  
  Friday, January 13, 2006. The snipers of the elite police squadron “Grupo Halcón” are anxiously awaiting the order. More than three hundred police officers scattered around the building are tuned in to their radios, waiting for their chief to give the green light. Miguel Sileo, the negotiator, presumes there’s a problem when the radio goes dead. He has been trying to strike a deal with Vitette, one of the leaders of the gang of bank robber inside the Banco Río branch in the Buenos Aires suburb of Acassuso. The pizzas that were ordered as a condition for surrender are now cold. The chief gives the go-ahead and Grupo Halcón enters the building, though what they discover comes as a total surprise: a pile of toy guns and over twenty terrified hostages. The robbers are nowhere to be found. As the hostages are questioned—the police believing that the thieves are hidden among them—other officers find that more than half of the bank’s safe deposit boxes have been emptied. A printed sign hanging in the vault reads, “A rich neighborhood/No guns, no bad blood/It was just about money/but not about love.” In an act worthy of Houdini, the robbers—Vitette, Araujo, De La Torre, Debauza, Marciano and El Gaita—have vanished into thin air.
  
  But there was one loose end. Months after the robbery, “La Turca,” the wife of bank robber Beto de la Torre, furious because her husband has run off with another woman to enjoy his fortune, goes to the police and reports all six criminals. One by one, they are all arrested. But the money is never recovered. Was the scorned wife a crack in another otherwise perfect plan—or was it just part of the plan by the mastermind behind the crime? Inspired by a true story, this film offers a play-by-play what became known in Argentina as “the heist of the century.”