Buenos Aires’s traditional commercial cinema district is in the Microcentro along the Lavalle pedestrian mall west of Florida and along Avenida Corrientes and Avenida Santa Fe. In addition, there are multiplexes in the shopping malls of Puerto Madero, Retiro, and Palermo, and in barrios such as Belgrano.

Imported films generally appear in the original language with Spanish subtitles, except for animated and children’s movies, which are dubbed into Spanish. Spanish-language translations of titles are often misleading, but the Buenos Aires Herald prints the original English title and translations of other foreign-language titles.

In the Microcentro, the Instituto Nacional de Cine y Artes Visuales (www.incaa.gov.ar) operates two central cinemas mostly promoting Argentine films: the four-screen Complejo Tita Merello (Suipacha 442, tel. 011/4322-1195) and the three-screen Cine Gaumont (Rivadavia 1635, tel. 011/4371-3050). At the Teatro San Martín’s Sala Leopoldo Lugones (Avenida Corrientes 1530, 10th floor, tel. 011/4371-0111), Werner Herzog is as mainstream as it gets.

The two-screen Complejo Cine Lorca (Avenida Corrientes 1428, tel. 011/4371-5017) shows mostly European films and the occasional off-center Hollywood flick (in the Bad Santa vein).

In Palermo, within a much larger art facility, the screening room at the Museo de Arte Latinomamericano de Buenos Aires (MALBA, Avenida Figueroa Alcorta 3415, tel. 011/4808-6500, www.malba.org.ar/web/cine.php) shows up to half a dozen classics, documentaries, and obscurities daily.