Las aventuras y desventuras de la familia Gaitán. La picaresca criolla, el realismo, la sátira, el documento y la crítica social, se combinan hábilmente para mostrar los conflictos y modos de expresión de personajes reales que viven en condiciones de marginalidad en el litoral santafecino.
Basado en el cuento homónimo del escritor argentino Mateo Boz.
The life of a family on a poor ranch near Santa Fe. They are threatened by the flooding of their valley by a dam construction. Government bureaucracy and ineptitude are satirised in this socio-political film. Everything starts when the families in a poor, mud-hut neighborhood lose what little they own in a bad flood. In steps the militia to rescue them, and then the local government comes next as the politicos hope to gain points by relocating the group of unfortunates. Nothing goes right for the essentially honest, simple villagers who are now the dispossessed. One family seeks temporary shelter in a boxcar and ends up being attached to a train that then takes them on an interesting journey.