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Nine Queens

Nine Queens
Nueve Reinas
9reinasposter.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Fabián Bielinsky
Produced by Cecilia Bossi
Pablo Bossi
Written by Fabián Bielinsky
Starring Gastón Pauls
Ricardo Darín
Leticia Brédice
Tomás Fonzi
Music by César Lerner
Cinematography Marcelo Camorino
Edited by Sergio Zottola
Distributed by Buena Vista International
Release date
  • August 31, 2000 (2000-08-31) (Argentina)
Running time
114 minutes
Country Argentina
Language Spanish
Budget $1.300.000
Box office $12,413,888

Nine Queens (Spanish: Nueve Reinas) is a 2000 Argentine crime drama film written and directed by Fabián Bielinsky and starring Ricardo Darín, Gastón Pauls, Leticia Brédice, Tomás Fonzi and Alejandro Awada.

The story centers on two con artists who meet and decide to cooperate in a major scam. The film was nominated for 28 awards and won 21 of them, and is now considered a classic in Argentina's film history.

The film opens at a convenience store early in the morning. Juan, a con artist, successfully scams the cashier, but later makes the mistake of attempting the same scam again on the next shift. Marcos, who has been observing the whole time, steps in pretending to be a police officer and takes Juan away. As soon as they are far enough from the shop, Marcos tells Juan he is not actually a cop but a fellow con man. Juan asks Marcos to show him the ropes, because his father, also a con man, is in jail and he needs to raise money quickly to bribe a judge to reduce his father's sentence from 10 years to 6 months.

Then a rare scheme seemingly falls into their laps: Sandler, a former business associate of Marcos, needs his help to sell counterfeit copies he made of some rare stamps called "The Nine Queens". The potential mark is Gandolfo, a rich Spaniard who is facing deportation and desperate to smuggle his wealth out of the country. He has no time to fully check if the stamps are authentic but he hires an expert to do a quick check and is satisfied. He offers $450,000 for the stamps, the exchange to take place that evening. In the intervening time, a number of things go wrong. The stamp expert demands a cut, as he knew the stamps were in fact forged. The fake stamps are then stolen out of Juan and Marcos' hands by crooks on motorcycles who, unaware of their value, destroy them by tossing them into a river.


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