John Doe.

Last year's Sin Nombre kept getting spoken of, and I remember seeing it advertised all over the place here in London. But I remember the poster just didn't do anything for me. I'd been a bit out of the loop with what was getting hype, but I'd hear about the film, think of the poster... it never appealed to me. Finally, someone said something that got me thinking about it and I thought, what the hell. Give it a shot. And damned glad I did.

Cary Fukunaga's Spanish language debut film is set in Mexico amongst the gangs and clans. Violence is the way of the streets, and most of the characters we are introduced to engage in it, or want to engage in it. El Casper is a member, initiating young Smiley whilst trying to lead a double life with a girlfriend from the right side of the tracks who is suspecting him of infidelity due to the hidden nature of his thug life. When she confronts him at a meeting of the gang one of Casper's peers rapes her and accidentally kills her. Shortly after they are robbing attempted illegal immigrants on top of a train going through Mexico towards the border with the US when the same gang member talks of raping another girl. Casper's response isn't positive.


Smiley heads back to the gang to tell them of what has happened to be threatened due to not taking action at the time. To make up for it he promises to get Casper before he escapes to the States. Casper meanwhile has managed to befriend the girl he protected, and the two get off the train together before the police pounce on the illegals. They make it to the border, but Smiley awaits...


Visually the film reminded me heavily of City of God, with the colours and the vibrancy, especially when mixed with the underworld themes. And the general vibe of the film radiated similar energy - it's hard to really pin it down beyond the obvious similarities between the two thematically. Like City of God, Sin Nombre is a terrific film.


Fukunaga brings incredible depth of emotion and character to a number of characters who should essentially be unlikeable. Casper is conflicted, this is shown from the outset, but the solidarity of the gang members and their feelings over their land and their fallen comrades is incredibly touching and no less valid than similar feelings outside of the world of violence. Smiley especially should not, by rights, be a sympathetic character, with his overwhelming desire to become a killer and his pledge to seek vengeance against someone who was merely standing up against the threatened rape of an innocent girl. But you do feel for him, you feel for his youth, his naivety and his lost future. In twenty years he will be a hardened criminal with no way out, if he makes it that far, but right now he is someone with no idea what he is getting himself into, but throwing himself into the perceived glamour of the lifestyle with scary gusto.


Relative unknown Adriano Goldman provides the beautiful images that, it has to be said, do seem to be becoming a bit par for the course for this sort of Mexican film. Yes, they are stunning to look at, but it's not entirely original. Props to his work, however, and I look forward to his next collaboration with Fukunaga on the upcoming adaptation of Jane Eyre - something very different indeed. I also remembered loving the music, what I remember of it.


Future husband Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna EPd the film, which was produced by Amy Kaufman, who interestingly EPd Bernal and Luna's breakout film Y Tu Mamá También. A terrific effort all round, definitely worth checking out and one worth remembering. 4.5 stars.

Not Sodomy...

Gomorrah was one of the most acclaimed non-English language films of 2008 (and not nominated for Oscar - sidenote: it's widely seen that the changing of the way the Academy selects the shortlisted titles for this category [whereby six are voted on by the branch membership at large and three are selected by an executive committee] is a result of both this film and 4 months, 3 weeks, 2 days failing to receive nominations despite their universal acclaim in their respective years and numerous awards and nominations in other high-profile ceremonies, including the Grand Prix at Cannes.) The film is very complex, a maze of almost half a dozen different narratives woven throughout the Naples gangster community, interlinked by how they are all affected by this mob influence on their lives, which are spent in very close proximity.

I'm not going to try and summarise the film, because that's nigh on impossible. As mentioned, it's very complex and interlinked, and without breaking the strands apart, which would make the film appear much more simplistic than it actually is, it would simply turn into a jumble of words with no real coherence for anyone who hasn't seen the film. I'm sure breakdowns exist out there anyway - why add to it.


What I will say is that the film is very good. The performances from the cast, both young and old, are very strong, and the film looks extraordinary, thanks to cinematographer Marco Onorato. The screenplay (by, like, half a dozen people, including director Matteo Garrone) weaves the narratives together very nicely, interlocking them and playing them against each other effortlessly. Moments of confusion are quickly dispelled as well - the stories are individually clear despite often common themes or locations. No doubt this has a lot to do with the work of editor Marco Spoleti, who holds it all together in exemplary fashion.


It's a damn good film, a great gangster film. I'm drawing parallels in my head to the grittiness and power of City of God, another film about the dangers of the underworld, and I think the comparison is warranted. It's dark and it's bloody, but it's worth it. 4.5 stars. 

Bigging up City of God - Again

Paste Magazine (via) has just ranked the incredible City of God at the top of their Top 50 of the decade list. Wham. Told you it was good.

Everyone's talking about O Brother, Where Art Thou? on their lists, so I think I'm going to have to suck it up and see it again. The concept actually fills me with dread. I hardly remember the first time I saw it, but I do remember not liking it.

I should also add Half Nelson to the list, I think.

While I'm Here...

I've decided to issue myself a challenge. That is to watch and blog 365 films in 365 days from the launch of this blog, and to try and include in that figure as many films from the previous list I published as possible, plus as many previous Best Picture winners I can lay my hands on (easily...)

By my count, I've ticked off City of God from the list (and I've just watched Let The Right One In, which I'll write up shortly), as well as Platoon from the Best Picture list. Which gives me 57 from the List (as it shall now be known), and a whole bunch from Oscar.

For the record, I'm running at eight films over eight says (including LTROI), so I'm off to an appropriate start.

Oh, and note that these posts aren't really real reviews. I'm not editing them, I'm not really reviewing them, I'm just writing them. For the most part they're coming moments after the film is viewed. So don't expect Ebert-esque masterpieces. Just the random ramblings of a random rambler. Don't like it? You know what to do.

God Indeed

Yesterday evening, post nap and pre sleepy-sleep time, I took it upon myself to raid the DVD collection sitting in the living room and belonging to my housemate in the hope of finding something entertaining that might kill those couple of awake hours inevitable between bouts of rest. There were a number of titles that elicited a reaction, but ultimately that which won out was the incredible City Of God (or Cidade de Deus to all ye purists.)

It's a film I have seen before (once? Twice? Does it matter?) and remember from the first instant loving. The first Fernando Meirelles film I saw (and can somebody PLEASE tell me how to pronounce his last name - I'm quite sure I've spent the last seven years fucking it up in an almighty fashion) grabbed me by whatever was hanging loose and pulled me rudely. It's an incredible film, truly. I'm not making this up. The IMDb Top 250 ranks it at number 16 (where is the hash key on a British keyboard? It's taken me 9 months to realise I know where it is...), it was nominated for four Oscars (Director, Editing, Cinematography and Adapted Screenplay - why it didn't receive a Foreign Language nomination is baffling) and is one of those films everyone who has seen it seems to truly admire.

It's the story of the slums of Rio de Janeiro, the rise (and fall) of the leader Lil Zé, and the escape of eventual photographer Rocket, apparently based on true events. It's hard to pinpoint exactly what makes this story fantastic. The narrative timeline cuts around as Meirelles and writer Bráulio Mantovani tell different people's stories, all linked by an otherwise linear voiceover from the aforementioned Rocket - it's almost an exercise in stream of consciousness digression - but does not in any way jar or confuse the viewer. It's an expert manner of communicating the story, vastly different to that used by, say, Guillermo Arriaga in 21 Grams, which seems to want to alienate the viewer, and even his Amores Perros, where the three interlinking stories to not actually directly combine. The individual characters and storylines are strong independently, but also when interlinked. The performances (primarily from non-actors or unknown actors) and stunning, considering.

VIsually it is much more than a feast. It's a Heston Blumenthal feast. It's all of Heston Blumenthal's feasts, twice, with all of the hottest people in the wold serving you. Naked. The way the camera zooms quickly on shots; the way it is unafraid to focus on something otherwise not the focus of the shot; the colours and light; the way it neither raises up the slums and the City of God as an alternate paradise, nor degrades it so that pity the residents for its mere physicality (rather you pity them for the goings-on). Everything works. You even start to admire the trigger-happy Lil Zé (like, seriously, trigger-happy. No first person computer combat game can match the trigger-happiness of Lil Zé) for the control he manages to exert.

I don't know how I can even go on praising this film. It is, pure and simple, one of the best films I've ever seen. Even though I don't think I'd seen it in the better part of six years, it was still a film that I would frequently rattle off as very high on my list. Now, I think, it shall be one of the first films that I rattle off, rather than one I tack onto the end.

5 stars. I want to give it 6, but I think that would just make my whole rating system farcical. And I think it's too early on to start doing that to myself.

GO AND SEE IT!