Birri was born in Santa Fe , Argentina . After being involved in theater and poetry , he went to Rome to study film-making at the '' Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia '' , from 1950 to 1953 , and appeared in the 1955 Italian film '' Gli Sbandati '' . In 1956 he returned to Santa Fe , to form the Film Institute at the Universidad Nacional del Litoral university . A year later he started filming scenes of poverty and human misery in lower-class Santa Fe . The project , billed as a " survey film " , spanned three years , and filming wrapped up in 1958 . Before screening the resulting 33-minute documentary , '' Tire dié '' , Birri debuted with a short film called '' La primera fundación de Buenos Aires '' , which premiered in the 1959 Cannes Film Festival , earning Birri critical acclaim and paving his way for further projects of similar nature , like '' Buenos Días , Buenos Aires '' ( 1960 ) and more famously '' Los inundados '' ( 1961 ) , which won the Venice Film Festival award for Best First Film
1959 Cannes Film Festival
1959 Cannes Film Festival
Fernando Birri