|
[ CINEMA ]
Review: Sin Nombre
Exodus from Honduras to the US means negotiating murder, love and gang warfare…
Certificate: TBC
Release date: 14 August 2009
Running time: 96 mins
Director: Cary Fukunaga
Writer: Cary Fukunaga
Stars: Paulina Gaitan, Edgar Flores, Kristian Ferrer, Marco Antonio Aguirre
Release date: 14 August 2009
Running time: 96 mins
Director: Cary Fukunaga
Writer: Cary Fukunaga
Stars: Paulina Gaitan, Edgar Flores, Kristian Ferrer, Marco Antonio Aguirre
ROUGHLY AN HOUR into Sin Nombre, the police turn up and start shooting at a bunch of unarmed Hondurans who are trying to get across the border on the roof of a train. It’s actually shocking to watch. Not because of what they’re doing, particularly: it’s shocking because until this moment, we’ve forgotten that the police even exist. For the first hour, the only law we see is gang law; the only authority is the kind that comes with too much testosterone and access to firearms; and since we’re clearly on the side of the regular-folks migrants, it never even occurs to us that the ‘proper’ forces of civilisation might want to stop them.
But then, all great underworld-based cinema is about tribal war, not about cops versus robbers. And Sin Nombre is as tribal as it gets. We’re not looking at an urban gang, at least not in the New York/LA sense, and they’re not city boys in leather jackets. This is a story from a hot, hot place, if not a desert then a town where the desert always makes its presence felt. It’s all sweat, blood and ritual here. The chief antagonist has a face full of tattoos that makes him look half-gangbanger, half-shaman. Imagine Darth Maul as a drugs kingpin, and you’ll get the idea.
THE PLOT is so rudimentary that it might as well not exist, but that’s not really the point. It’s a simple tale of boy-has-girl, girl-gets-murdered-by-gang-enforcer, boy-meets-better-girl, boy-kills-gang-enforcer-in-order-to-stop-her-being-murdered-as-well, boy-runs-like-hell-to-avoid-gang’s-wrath. No, wait… that’s looking at it from the boy’s point of view, and the film makes sure that we also see it from the girl’s. To her, it all seems baffling, horrific, and senseless. And so it should: the rules of the gang are spurious enough to make us realise that this isn’t a world of good against evil, it’s a world of adolescents who’ve got no reason to grow up.
What’s wrong with this film…? It shouldn’t be one. This isn’t some self-contained story, it’s the pilot episode of a TV series that’s about as good as everyone thinks The Wire is. Given the grand tragedy of it all, though, it would be wise not to expect one.
But then, all great underworld-based cinema is about tribal war, not about cops versus robbers. And Sin Nombre is as tribal as it gets. We’re not looking at an urban gang, at least not in the New York/LA sense, and they’re not city boys in leather jackets. This is a story from a hot, hot place, if not a desert then a town where the desert always makes its presence felt. It’s all sweat, blood and ritual here. The chief antagonist has a face full of tattoos that makes him look half-gangbanger, half-shaman. Imagine Darth Maul as a drugs kingpin, and you’ll get the idea.
THE PLOT is so rudimentary that it might as well not exist, but that’s not really the point. It’s a simple tale of boy-has-girl, girl-gets-murdered-by-gang-enforcer, boy-meets-better-girl, boy-kills-gang-enforcer-in-order-to-stop-her-being-murdered-as-well, boy-runs-like-hell-to-avoid-gang’s-wrath. No, wait… that’s looking at it from the boy’s point of view, and the film makes sure that we also see it from the girl’s. To her, it all seems baffling, horrific, and senseless. And so it should: the rules of the gang are spurious enough to make us realise that this isn’t a world of good against evil, it’s a world of adolescents who’ve got no reason to grow up.
What’s wrong with this film…? It shouldn’t be one. This isn’t some self-contained story, it’s the pilot episode of a TV series that’s about as good as everyone thinks The Wire is. Given the grand tragedy of it all, though, it would be wise not to expect one.
Archive: CINEMA
Article by Lawrence Miles
Table of contents: 30-07-2009 - Issue 3
