A demonstration outside Argentina’s classic Gaumont movie theater was met with a police crackdown on Thursday, with officers tear gassing the crowd and arresting four people.

The Thursday afternoon demonstration outside the Gaumont, in Congress Square, was organized to reject massive government funding cuts for the National Institute of Film and Audiovisual Arts (INCAA, by its Spanish initials). The Gaumont itself, which is state-owned, is in danger of being sold due to the cuts. 

The brutal police response was met with hurt, anger and sadness by representatives of the Argentine film sector, for whom the Gaumont, far from a site of violent struggle, has long represented a prestigious monument to homegrown audiovisual talent.

Members of the ATE state employees’ union who work at INCAA called the gathering to protest layoffs at the film institute and “defend movies and culture.” President Javier Milei’s administration officially suspended the institute’s operational funding on Tuesday, as part of its austerity plan for the public sector.

Multiple organizations of cinema workers attended, voicing their opinions and demands through an open mic in front of the theater. The protest went on peacefully for just over an hour before Buenos Aires City police arrived and started pushing people off the street, in line with the new anti-protest protocol that forbids roadblocks.

“People were on the street because there was not enough room on the sidewalk for everyone. The plaza in front of the Gaumont was also full,” said Ezequiel Radusky, a director present at the protest who is also a member of Cine Argentino Unido, an organization of filmmakers, screenwriters, producers, and cinema technical workers.

Police began shoving protesters with shields before throwing tear gas into the crowds. People on the sidewalk who stumbled on the street, trying to flee the gas, were met with officers impeding them from moving on. The situation led to tussles and four arrests.

“There was no problem or violence until the police began clamping down,” renowned actor Leonardo Sbaraglia, who attended the protest, told C5N news station. “They threw tear gas, acting like we had guns; we had nothing.”

The four detainees have been identified as Nicolas Carnavale, Nicolas Mayorga, Mario de Almeida, and Lucas Peralta. Radusky told the Herald that Carnevale has been freed and that the whereabouts of the other three are known and being monitored. Legal proceedings to free them are currently under way. 

BA City Police Chief Diego Kravetz posted late Thursday that the four people detained had been arrested for injuring two officers during the crackdown. “The police are the maximum authority on the street and assaulting them has consequences,” he wrote on X. BA City Security Minister Waldo Wolff wrote on X that the government would pursue criminal charges against the “aggressors” of the police agents.  

Photos by Pablo Felicine