A deceptively straightforward parable lies at the heart of this tender and delicate film about the triangular relationship among the moviegoer, daily life and the cinema. Cinephiles curious about the day-to-day tasks of a film programmer will be fascinated by A Useful Life’s behind-the-scenes look at the Uruguayan Cinematheque as it strives to keep its doors open. Ultimately the film comes to focus on the struggle of a middle-aged curator to define himself outside of the office—meaning, in this case, outside the movie theater. Veiroj’s composition of the frame and his use of editing and mise-en-scène recall the filmmaking of the mid-twentieth century, somewhere between prewar classical style and the revolutions of the New Waves, a period that retained a touching curiosity about the world and a robust faith in cinema’s ability to explore everyday reality.