UFOs in Zacapa (orig. OVNIs en Zacapa) [2014]

MPAA (UR would be PG-13)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing

Official website

El Guatamalteco article about*

América Tevé (S. Pérez) review*
LaNacion.com (A. Sánchez) review*


UFOs in Zacapa (orig. OVNIs en Zacapa) [2014] [IMDb] (directed by Marcos Machado [IMDb], screenplay by Enrique Pérez [IMDb]) is a GUATAMALAN / COSTA RICAN (and at least in part CUBAN supported ...) often tongue-in-cheek / Big Lebowski [1998]-like "UFO Conspiracy" movie that played recently at the 2015 -- 31st Chicago Latino Film Festival.

The CUBAN connection to the film was both almost certainly NECESSARY and, at times, UNFORTUNATE.  It probably was NECESSARY because my guess is that the Guatemala-based group (a "collective") that made the film (Best Picture System) -- both _quite talented_ and _quite funny_ -- WOULD PROBABLY NEVER HAVE BEEN ASSEMBLED without Cuban government support (film-making does require both organization and money ...).  But it's UNFORTUNATE because as fun as the film often is, its underlying anti-(North) Americanism is both obvious and at times quite heavy-handed.  Sigh ... BUT I've ALSO often noted / railed-against some of the more-or-less obvious right-wing and even racist messaging in (North) American (Hollywood) children's films as well.

That all said, this is a clever locally-set (in Guatemala) Latin American UFO Conspiracy film and even the North American connection to the conspiracy proposed actually meshes well with current (North) American conspiracy theories -- A LOT of the "UFO sightings" in the (North) American West notably around "Area 51" are now attributed to U.S. military projects ...

What then is the story spun in the current film?

Rober Daneri (played by Daneri Gudiel [IMDb]), a native Guatemalan, has been tormented since childhood by the disappearance (back in the 1980s ...) of his dad.  He remembers when he was about ten, a jeep carrying some military personnel coming to their house somewhere in the Guatemalan countryside and that the soldiers had spent a fair amount of time talking to his dad before leaving again.  He had asked his dad about this somewhat odd / unnerving visit.  His dad, of course, assured him that it was nothing.  But later that night, Rober was awakened by bright lights and noise outside, his dad standing in the midst of those blinding lights and then ... well ... disappearing.

From that point on, Rober was convinced that his dad was somehow abducted ... by aliens.  And when he grew up, he wrote a book entitled "We've Never Been Alone" about said aliens, which brought him some ridicule in the Guatemalan press, which like the Press _anywhere_ both LIKES "UFO Stories" and LIKES TO RIDICULE their proponents.

Anyway, after enduring a good amount of ridicule for his book (whose title actually sounds more like a complaint -- suggesting that he wished "that we'd just be left alone ..." ;-), he's asked by local Guatemalan TV personality Leyla Marroquin (played by Alejandra Estrada [IMDb]) to serve as "her expert" in investigating reports of UFO sightings AND ABDUCTIONS in and around the town of Zacapa, Guatemala.  

Initially, he doesn't want to participate, noting that he's already been abused in local tabloid television programs, but he consents to go along with it because becomes clear to him that (1) he's going to continue to be ridiculed anyway, and (2) Leyla's going to do her "investigative show" with or without him.

Well, after they arrive in Zacapa, they find that (1) there are strange lights frequently flying about in the night -- they themselves see them, (2) there have been all kinds of locals who have been abducted at night, often associated with those lights, never to be seen again, and (3) a goofy and goofily hopeful local cult has even begun to be formed around these UFO sightings / abductions.  There's a local self-styled "prophet" who claims he can communicate with the aliens, and people even come to him ASKING TO BE ABDUCTED ... some come to be abducted while others are not ...

What the heck is going on?  Rober smells some kind of a fraud, until he himself sees the lights, and finds himself at least temporarily unconscious / abducted (he wakes up in his hotel room, not knowing how he got there).   From that point on, he _really_ wants to figure out what's going on.  Leyla and her cameraman, however, seem to be more focused-on / fascinated-by the spectacle of it all -- "strange things happening to strange people..." 

Some "clarity" starts to come into the picture when Rober is visited by "a representative" of a local drug dealer (!) who leaves him a rather thick file of police reports / press clippings on the abductions, suggesting rather strongly that he read the file and then ... kindly leave town.

Rober begins quite quickly to put "two and two" together.  Leyla and her cameraman need perhaps a bit more persuasion...

... but in the end everybody seems to come out "okay" except, of course, Rober, who never wanted to go out there to Zacapa in the first place.

So what was happening out there in Zacapa?  And what happened to Rober?   And how could Leyla and her cameraman come out "okay" if Rober did not?  Well guess ...

Again, it's an interesting take on the UFO phenomenon ... ;-)

The filmmakers -- director as well as several of the actors -- present for a Q/A session after the screening at the Chicago Latino Film Festival promise to make the film available (for free and/or a simple donation, again THEIR GROUP IS NOT OUT TO MAKE MONEY) through their website and/or vimeo channel in the next year or two -- after the film makes a run through local Central American / Caribbean theaters.  

All in all, this proved to be a very interesting film.  I do wish that the anti-(North) Americanism wasn't so blatant at times.  On the other hand, I do appreciate that the group probably wouldn't exist if not for the Cuban help -- and that would be a shame.  For the makers of this film are a quite talented group.


* Decent enough (sense) translations of non-English webpages can be found by viewing them through Google's Chrome browser. 

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Forgotten (orig. Olvidados) [2014]

MPAA (UR would be R)  Fr. Dennis (4+ Stars)

IMDb listing
FilmAffinity.com/es listing*

Official Website*

Cinema without Borders interview with Carla Ortíz
El Diario de Bolivia editorial* 
CNN Español entrevista con Carla Ortíz
LA Times (M. Ordoña) article about 2014 Best Foreign Film Standouts

CinemasCine.net (M.M. Caballero) review*
CinEncuentro.net (M.C. Molina) review*
El Mostrador.cl (EFE) review*
La-Razon.com (P. Susz K.) review*
NotiCine.net (C. Moure) review*
Opinion.com.bo (G. Cornejo Bascopé) review*
PaginaSiete.bo (A. Echalar Ascarrunz) review*
TragaCine.net (A.G. Dagron) review*

The Hollywood Reporter (J. Holland) review

Forgotten (orig. Olvidados) [2014] [IMDb] [FAes]* (directed by Carlos Bolado [IMDb] [FAes]* [SC]*, screenplay by Marizio D'Avis [IMDb], Carla Ortiz [IMDb] [FAes]*[SC]* and Elia Petridis [IMDb]) is an _unforgettable_ BOLIVIAN Cold War (1970s-80s) Era historical drama about "Operation Condor" [es.wikip]* [en.wikip] in South America.

Operation Condor" [es.wikip]* [en.wikip] was a clandestine multinational "black op" that involved the cooperation of the militaries / intelligence services of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Paraquay and Uruguay with the assistance and arguably supervision of the United States.  The infamous School of the Americas [en.wikip] [SOA-Watch] provided much of the "counter insurgency training" and the CIA then "helped with direction" ...  The operation was responsible for the "disappearance" (capture/abduction, detention, torture and finally murder/disposal) of 10,000s of Leftists (and often those _merely suspected of being leftists_) in those countries.  While difficult to say, AS MANY AS 60,000, MOSTLY YOUNG, PEOPLE WERE CAPTURED, TORTURED, KILLED AND DISPOSED-OF IN THIS ANTI-COMMUNIST, "COUNTER INSURGENCY" OPERATION.

Needless to say this was one heck of subject matter for a movie.  And interestingly enough the film was Bolivia's submission to the 2014 Oscars for Best Foreign Language Film.  It played recently at the 2015 -- 31st Annual Chicago Latino Film Festival, with both Mexican director Carlos Bolado [IMDb] [FAes]* [SC]* and Bolivian actress-producer of the film Carla Ortiz [IMDb] [FAes]*[SC]* present after the two screenings to take questions and answers.

[Two years ago at the 2013 - 29th Chicago Latino Film Festival, I saw director Bolado's [IMDb] [FAes]* [SC]* previous film, the also excellent, Tlatelolco, Summer of 68 (orig. Tlatelolco, Verano del 68) [2013] about the largely forgotten Tienanmen Square style massacre of at least 300 and possibly THOUSANDS of Mexican students that occurred in Mexico City three weeks before the start of the 1968 Summer Olympic Games that were held there that year.  He was present at that screening as well].

At the Q&A following the current film, I asked the two what was the Academy's reaction to this film.  After all, while Hollywood often has a "left leaning reputation," in my reviews of the Academy Awards [2] I have consistently maintained that the Academy is generally or even _supremely_ "middle of the road."  So in my question I expressed my concern that while some in Hollywood would perhaps like the film, [many (!)] others would be absolutely terrified of it.

 Carla Ortiz [IMDb] [FAes]*[SC]* responded that actually the film got a good reception, earning earning some interviews / buzz (interviews above) as well as making "the short list - top 10" among the films for the Best Foreign Language Film award.  However, it clearly didn't make the top five, which she attributed to her film's humble origins.  It's conventional wisdom these days that to win an Oscar requires organizing/financing a fairly large campaign for it.

Perhaps.  But with the exception of people like Oliver Stone [wikip] [IMDb] or perhaps Miloš Forman [wikip] [IMDb] (though Forman actually came/fled from a country (my parents' country...) that was brutalized by "the other side," the Communists, during the Cold War), or perhaps Angelina Jolie [wikip] [IMDb], it's difficult to imagine many in Hollywood having the stomach for a film like this.  Let me put it this way: THIS FILM WOULD BE THE 1970s-80s ERA ABSOLUTE COUNTER POINT TO A FILM LIKE AMERICAN SNIPER [2014] -- giving the stories of / HUMANIZING the nameless people who someone like Navy SEAL Sgt. Kyle would be blowing the heads off of.


So what then of the film?  FIRST, THIS IS AN EXCELLENT FILM.  It would "rock the world" of a lot of (North) American / Western viewers, who would find it difficult to imagine that these kind of things could happen arguably in our name.  But it is excellent, with well-developed characters covering the vast expanse of the story.

The story is built around two characters, father and son, Bolivian, the father being (today) a retired highly decorated Bolivian General named José Mendieta (played in the film throughout by Damián Alcázar [IMDb] [FAes]* [SC]*) and his now 30-something son Pablo (played by Bernardo Peña  [IMDb] [FAes]*) now living / working as a banker in New York with a (North) American wife and young son.

Pablo was literally born in the midst of the trauma / chaos of those years in southern South America.  As Pablo grew-up, he apparently DIDN'T ASK any questions, and his father then COLONEL José Mendieta, in as much as he'd be around at all during those years, certainly DIDN'T TELL him (or ANYBODY ELSE outside of his chain of command) much either.  BUT now retired EVER RESPECTED, HIGHLY DECORATED General José Mendieta WAS DYING and HE NEEDED TO GET SOME THINGS OFF OF HIS CHEST.

So ... he asks Pablo to come home.  AND IN CASE PABLO DIDN'T MAKE IT HOME IN TIME ... HE STARTS WRITING HIS CONFESSION DOWN ...

What did he need to tell his son, NOW ...?  Well that's of course the rest of the story.

It begins in the mid-1970s with promising Bolivian officer José Mendieta along with many others of his similar "promise" / mid-level rank having been sent to the U.S. Army Special Forces run School of the Americas [en.wikip] [SOA-Watch] then located "offshore" in Panama for "counter insurgency training."

There, these young, again _promising_ "best of the best" officers from throughout Latin America were trained in the "tactics" of this "new kind of war" -- coming-in QUICKLY and with OVERWHELMING FORCE, kicking down the doors of suspected leftists, urban guerrillas (today, we'd call them terrorists), "DISAPPEARING THEM" (ABDUCTING them / taking them to some DISORIENTINGLY FAR/STRANGE/PERHAPS EVEN FOREIGN "UNDISCLOSED LOCATION"), TORTURING THEM and EVENTUALLY DISPOSING OF THEM (Readers here would find these tactics STRIKINGLY SIMILAR to the tactics used by the U.S. Military / Intelligence services in the early years of the post-9/11 War on Terror ... Indeed, the U.S. PATRIOT ACT sought to provide a U.S. legal framework to allow, if need be, for terrorist _suspects_ to be EFFECTIVELY DISAPPEARED even from here in the United States...)

There, at the School of the Americas, these "bright young officers FROM ALL OVER Latin America," ALSO "NETWORKED," MADE LONG-TERM, EVEN LIFE-LONG FRIENDSHIPS, after all this was going to be a CONTINENTAL BATTLE AGAINST COMMUNISM and WHY NOT bring the "young, best and the brightest" together from among the militaries involved and HELP THEM TO BECOME _FRIENDS_.

And so it was, good ole Bolivian officer José Morieta met and became very close friends with Argentinian officer Sanera (played by Rafael Ferro [IMDb] [FAes]*) and the COLONELS then PROPOSE TO THEIR RESPECTIVE "HIGHER UP" (THE GENERALS) from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay even Uruguay setting-up a central clandestine interrogation / detention center high-up in the mountains of ... BOLIVIA ... to which then abducted / "disappeared" leftists / suspected leftists FROM ALL OVER SOUTHERN LATIN AMERICA were taken ... and interrogated / tortured.

Imagine how disorienting it would have been for someone from MONTEVIDEO, URUGUAY or RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL, or VALPARAISO, CHILE or BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA to be abducted and then sometime later finding oneself jailed SOMEWHERE in the middle of the F-ING MOUNTAINS, with ALL KINDS OF ACCENTS SPOKEN BY THE INTERROGATING OFFICERS with the GUARDS LOOKING LIKE MORE-OR-LESS LIKE INCAS... WITH UTTER HORROR REALIZING that NO ONE BACK HOME WOULD HAVE A CLUE WHERE THEY WERE.  NONE.  ZERO.  NADA.

Now to the film's credit, the film DOES SHOW that the THERE REALLY WAS A COORDINATED MULTINATIONAL LEFT-WING INSURGENCY TAKING PLACE IN SOUTHERN LATIN AMERICA AT THE TIME. 

One of the characters, Marco (played by Carlotto Cotta [IMDb] [FAes]*), a young, idealistic Brazilian born journalist writing for France's Le Monde newspaper, with a young, PREGNANT Bolivian wife Lucia (Carla Ortiz [IMDb] [FAes]*[SC]*), is shown talking to friends in Argentina or perhaps Chile in quite excited 20-something fashion that HE THOUGHT that the various nominally independent left-wing urban-guerrilla groups throughout much of Latin America are working IN COORDINATED FASHION. 

Well of course, his friends, or at least some of them, turn out to be on the radar of one or another of the countries involved, and so the security forces (of be it Argentina or Chile) kick down the doors one evening in the midst of a party and ABDUCT THE LOT OF THEM, including MARCO and his PREGNANT WIFE LUCIA ... and sometime later, they all find themselves in this dank, high Andean Bolivian prison, filled WITH SCREAMS and PEOPLE (both interrogators and prisoners) FROM ALL OVER SOUTHERN LATIN AMERICA.

There, the new prisoners are told by the more seasoned (and MORE MILITANT COMMUNIST...) ones NOT TO TELL ANYBODY ANYTHING.  (Most of course HAVE NOTHING REALLY TO TELL ...).

Why?  Why not tell the interrogators that they have NOTHING to TELL?  Well they're told by the more hardened / militant prisoners: "You're at the end of the line here.  The ONLY THING that will keep you alive is the belief on the part of your torturers that you still have something more to tell them.  As soon as they are convinced that they have nothing (more) to get out of you, you'll get a bullet in your head and that will be that."

Well pregnant Lucia there actually takes to task one of the more fanatical Argentinian (Communist) prisoners named Andrea (played by Ana Calentano [IMDb] [FAes]*): "Well, I have NOTHING to tell them, MY HUSBAND HAS NOTHING TO TELL THEM.  We're here ONLY BECAUSE OF PEOPLE LIKE YOU."  "You're NOT HERE BECAUSE OF 'PEOPLE LIKE ME,' YOU'RE HERE BECAUSE YOU LIVE IN A DICTATORSHIP."  "But we could vote, everything WAS FINE until YOU WITH YOUR ARROGANT IDEOLOGY started BLOWING EVERYTHING UP."  "BUT how LONG WERE YOU WILLING TO WAIT BEFORE a true democracy would ever emerge?  DON'T YOU SEE THAT _SOME OF US WERE TIRED_ OF HAVING _EVERYTHING_ DECIDED BY THE SAME SMALL GROUP OF PEOPLE ALL THE TIME."  "BUT YOU WERE A TINY GROUP OF PEOPLE AS WELL ..." "BUT WITH OUR CAMPAIGN, AND THE DICTATORSHIP'S REACTION TO IT, WE WERE ABLE TO EXPOSE THE LIES UNDERLINING THE WHOLE PRESENT SYSTEM."  "But will PEOPLE LIKE ME and MY HUSBAND, INNOCENTS after all, EVER GET OUT (to see ANYTHING of what MIGHT change ...)."

I freely admit that if I were locked-up in an Andean dungeon like this where these people were locked-up, often SCREAMING while being BEING TORTURED, WITH NO HOPE OF EVER LEAVING ALIVE, _I'D_ be looking to hang myself (and I'm a Catholic Priest). THIS WAS A LIVING INCARNATION OF HELL.

As many as 60,000 people across Southern Latin America DIED in places like this ... almost NONE of their bodies ever recovered.

In the Q/A the director actually noted the he could have easily made the film EVEN DARKER than it was.  After all, the script was based on hair-raising documentation, often from Amnesty International, from that time. 

This was ONE HECK OF A FILM.  But one that honestly deserves, indeed SCREAMS even HOWLS, to be seen.


* Decent enough (sense) translations of non-English webpages can be found by viewing them through Google's Chrome browser. 

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Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 [2015]

MPAA (PG)  CNS/USCCB (A-1)  ChicagoTribune (1 Star)  RE.com (0 Stars)  AV Club (C+)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (K. Jensen) review
ChicagoTribune (R. Moore) review
RogerEbert.com (C. Lemire) review
AVClub.com (J. Hessenger) review

RottenTomatoes.com (T. Ryan) review

Okay, by any sentient being's estimation Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 [2015] (directed by Andy Fickman, screenplay by Kevin James and Nick Bekay) was gonna be a SILLY / "STUPID" MOVIE ;-).  But honestly SO WERE THE THREE STOOGES.  And though the venerable media critics considered to have "a special place" by the RottenTomatoes.com website GAVE THIS FILM a ZERO rating -- yes that's ZERO -- I'D WEAR THAT ZERO RATING as A BADGE OF HONOR.  I write this because IMHO this was ONE FUNNY (often PAINFULLY FUNNY) MOVIE ;-).

As in the 2009 original, Paul Blart (played perfectly / sincerely straight by Kevin James) is a RANDOM / UTTERLY AVERAGE security guy at a shopping mall, a "mall cop."  Who respects "mall cops"?  Nobody.  Who aspires to "one day grow-up to be a mall cop?"  Nobody.   But there he is, a mall cop, representing EVERYBODY who's ever found oneself (or finds oneself) in a job that IS PERHAPS NEEDED, but NOBODY really cares about.

... 'CEPT of course for someone like Paul Blart, who knowing, "okay I'm (just) a security guy at a shopping mall," STILL SINCERELY TRIES TO BE THE BEST "MALL COP" THAT HE COULD POSSIBLY BE.  Why?  Because THAT'S WHAT HE IS, a MALL COP.  And honestly, if you're not proud of who you are, who will be?   And then he has a family -- his beloved 70-80 y/o mother who gets actually run-over by a speeding milk truck SECONDS INTO THIS MOVIE as she reaches out into the street for the newspaper (probably MIS-THROWN there by some _careless paperboy_) one morning; and then his UTTERLY ADORABLE chubby but ALWAYS SMILING, now TEENAGE DAUGHTER Maya (played MAGNIFICENTLY by Raini Rodriguez) who LOVES him, even WORSHIPS him.  Why?  Because HE'S HER DAD.

I LOVE THIS FILM.

I can honestly say that MY WORLD is FILLED WITH PAUL and MAYA BLARTS, good and often largely invisible people who WITHOUT THEM the world would be a much more difficult AND HONESTLY MUCH LONELIER PLACE.  AND AS AN ETERNAL "Associate" I know a thing or two about "not being a somebody."

Yet we're given (if we believe, by God...) what we're given and asked to do the best that we can with that.  (And we CAN ALWAYS do A LOT ... we CAN always CHOOSE to make the world around us a better place, NO MATTER WHERE WE ARE or ROLE / POSITION THAT WE HAVE ... ;-) ... LIKE "WRITE A BLOG" ;-) ;-)

The current film begins with Paul and Maya each getting surprising letters bearing "good news" in the mail.  Paul's invited TO BE HONORED at a NATIONAL CONVENTION OF MALL SECURITY PERSONEL (Yup, there appears to be truly a "National Assoc." for everything ;-) to be held in LAS VEGAS and MAYA gets a letter of acceptance to UCLA (the Blarts live in New Jersey ...) for college next year.

Paul's happy/ecstatic to have received his letter ("It's about time ... that I should be so honored" ;-), while Maya doesn't know how to break _her_ "good news" to her loving if over-protective dad.

Much, much, much, often corny but utterly heartfelt ensues ...

I'll also say here that James' timing in this film is phenomenal.  A lot of the jokes in the film are physical, yes, A LOT LIKE THE OLD HUMOR of THE THREE STOOGES.  And he honestly PULLS IT OFF, REPEATEDLY, OVER AND OVER AGAIN ... It's a film that makes one laugh-out-loud, REPEATEDLY, and at times makes one cry.

AND PARENTS, YES, THE "PG" RATING IS UTTERLY APPROPRIATE.  This film is for just about everybody!

So good job PAUL & MAYA!  Good job Kevin James / Raini Rodriguez, IMHO you really pulled this film off ;-)


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Betibú [2014]

MPAA (UR would be PG-13)  APUM (3 Stars) Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
FilmAffinity.com/es listing*
CineNational.com listing*

APU-Mohicano (A. Núñez Stock) review*
CinesArgentinos.com.ar (Chandler) review*
ElPais.com (J. Ocaña) review*
El Espectador Avezado (R. Gallego) review*
EscribiendoCine.com (E. Obregon) review*
LaNacion.com.ar (D. Batile) review*

CultureFly.co.uk [S. Mayne] review
Global Cinema (R. Stafford) review
The Hollywood Reporter (J. Holland) review


Betibú [2014] [IMDb] [FAes]* [CN]* [SC]* (directed and screenplay cowritten by Miguel Cohan [IMDb] [FAes]* [SC]* along with Ana Cohan [IMDb] [CN]* [SC]* based on the novel [GR] [WCat] [Amzn] by Claudia Piñeiro [es.wikip]* [GR]* [Amzn] [IMDb] [CN]* [SC]*) is a fun / well-crafted contemporary ARGENTINIAN who-done-it / noirish crime thriller that played recently at the 2015 - 31st Chicago Latino Film Festival.

The story is set around a murder of a rich older man named Pedro Chazaretta.  His housekeeper found him one day, still sitting in his chair in the living room on the second floor of his well kept / quite spacious home, his throat slit, apparently from behind, old jazz record still spinning on the stylish turntable.

Okay, a murder of a rich guy, in this case Argentinian ... so what?   As always in a good, well spun "genre" tale, there's more going on than just a "regular" / "run of the mill" murder.

The murder, of course, causes a local / national media sensation, the more so, since Chazaretta had been accused (and acquitted) some years back in the suspicious death of his wife.  That suspicious death (and the investigation into Chazaretta's possible involvement) had previously caused a local/national media sensation.  So every newspaper / media outlet in the country (Argentina) was sending-in its "best people" to cover this story.

Enter the Buenos Aires Tribune, a newspaper / media outlet (fictionalized), which like newspapers / media outlets _everywhere_ else has been trying to adapt / survive / maintain an audience in an environment increasingly dominated by the internet.

Indeed, the Tribune's managing editor Lorenzo Rinaldi (played by José Coronado [IMDb] [FAes]* [CN]* [SC]*) had recently made the decision of offering his grizzled veteran crime reporter Jaime Brena (played by Daniel Fanego [IMDb] [FAes]* [CN]* [SC]*) an "early retirement package" in favor of a (presumably cheaper) "fresh out of journalism school" 20-something newbie Mariano Saravia (played by Alberto Ammann [IMDb] [FAes]* [CN]* [SC]*) to lead his paper's "crime beat." Of course, Lorenzo wasn't expecting such a sensational murder to pop-up just as he was trying to lead the paper in this cost-cutting transition.  So good-ole Lorenzo has to "eat crow" a bit as he goes "hat in hand" to Brena's appropriately gritty "hole-in-the-wall" apartment to ask him to "stay on for a bit longer" to help the still "quite green" Mariano tackle the case for the paper.  Besides, Brena covered (quite well) the suspicious death of Chazaretta's wife a few years back as well ...

But the business minded Lorenzo also realizes that he needs more than a couple of "crime reporters" on this story.  He needs a ringer ... someone who'll bring people WITH KINDS OF MEDIA CHOICES (BACK) TO HIS PAPER.  And so ... as a GOOD MANAGER (and perhaps reflective of his desperation to "get this right...") he decides to eat yet "more crow": 

He calls-up an old flame, a famed (Argentine) mystery/thriller writer Nurit Iscar aka Betibú (played by Mercedes Morán [IMDb] [FAes]* [CN]* [SC]*), offering her a large enough number of column inches on the front page each day to stop her eyes from rolling (Lorenzo was married when they started dating, and she finally dumped him when she finally/painfully realized that he'll never leave his wife).  He tells her that the other two -- she knows Brena, not "the new guy" -- would help her with the research, but that he, HIS PAPER, needs HER celebrated writing skills to "sell the story" ON / FOR HIS PAPER.

The other two don't mind.  Brena's just pissed-off because no-matter what the outcome, he's losing his job at the end of the tale because (and he knows it) he's "a dinosaur."  Mariano perhaps doesn't even realize that eventually he's going to have to stand on his own stories.  But both are actually kinda impressed to be working with a top-notch nationally renowned (celebrity) crime novelist.

So this then was the team that "The Trib" outfitted to tackle this case (and the nation's other major newspapers / media outlets were presumably busily assembling similarly impressive teams).

And a good part of the film's charm is of course this subtext of "what today's media outlets have to do to compete / survive" and even the more-or-less obvious scandal being presented here in the "Entertainment-izing of the News." After all the Trib's managing editor HIRED a FICTION WRITER to be the _lead writer_ ON A NEWS STORY ... ;-)

But let's get back to the murder...

A murder of a rich guy would probably make news anywhere.  But this is, of course, contemporary Argentina, with its own cultural / subtextual concerns.

It becomes clear that part of what shocks and even offends the Argentine populace is WHERE the murder takes place.  Good ole Chazaretta was murdered in his luxurious home LOCATED INSIDE one of those SUPER-SECURE "gated communities" that much of Latin America (including famously Argentina) is (in)famous for.  And the murder itself ISN'T what really "offends" the average Argentine reader (or the Argentine writer like Nurit "Betibú" Iscar).  Instead, what really offends the average Argentine is _the existence_ of these SUPER-EXCLUSIVE "gated communities."

Nurit Iscar, famed Argentine novelist and armed with a "Press Pass" CAN'T EVEN GET INTO THE GATED COMMUNITY without jumping through all kinds of demeaning hoops: "Who do you know who's living here?" "Nobody, I'm going there ON BEHALF OF THE TRIBUNE to write about the guy murdered there." "Well we need a name and phone number of a resident to call."  "HE'S DEAD ... you idiots ..." "Well, I'm sorry we're not allowed to let just anybody in." "I'M NOT JUST ANYBODY, YOU KNOW WHO I AM (I'll autograph a book for you if I have to ...) AND I'M GOING THERE TO WRITE FOR ONE OF OUR MAJOR PAPERS (here's a copy of today's edition if you need one...) ..." "Well, I need someone INSIDE to call."  "Argh ..."

When Nurit finally gets in, she talks into her dictaphone: "Here I am investigating a murder that should not have happened.  And I wonder what's more terrifying to residents of this gated community Las Maravillas (The Wonders), that A MURDERER was able to slip through all their security OR that A MURDERER may be in living in their midst ..."
 
What then of the murder?  This is, of course Argentina.  Chazaretta was, of course, a "rich guy."  But in Argentina, "rich guys" who live in ISOLATED, HEAVILY PROTECTED GATED COMMUNITIES are a relatively small circle of people and ... people who basically _all know each other_ AND THEN PRETTY MUCH ALL THEIR LIVES ...

So, what happened?

Well a team with a old grizzled "crime reporter" who'd "know a guy" for everything, "guys" who'd know "every plumber, electrician, auto mechanic, and ... (again, this is Argentina) every army PX-clerk in the country" would come-up with some leads.  Similarly a team with "a young guy" who "knows a thing or two about social media / Facebook" ;-) would come up with some leads as well (Maybe the old Patriarchs / Good ole Boys wouldn't use Facebook but their kids, grand-kids and nephews would ;-) --.  And then someone with the imagination of a successful who-done-it / crime novelist could connect the dots ;-).

It makes for a very fun and well spun story ...

And one that EVERYONE living in our world today could appreciate.   So good job folks!  Good job!


* Decent enough (sense) translations of non-English webpages can be found by viewing them through Google's Chrome browser. 

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One for the Road (orig. En el Último Trago) [2014]

MPAA (UR would be R)  Fr. Dennis (4+ Stars)

IMDb listing
FilmAffinity.com/es listing*

Chilango.com (J. Pérez) review*
CineGarage.com review*
CinemaTradicional.com (A. Acuña Navarijo) review*
CinePremiere.com.mx (A. Magaña) review*
CorreCamera.com (D. Farjí) review*
CorreCamera.com (H Lara) review*
El Rincón de Dacne (C. Bernal Romero) review*
El Universal.com.mx (J. Mérida) review*
Hoy (G. Orozco) review*


One for the Road (orig. En el Último Trago) [2014] [IMDb] [FAes]* (directed and cowritten by Jack Zagha Kababie [IMDb] [FAes]* along with David Desloa [IMDb] and Yossy Zagha Kababie [IMDb]) is a lovely / nostalgic OCTOGENARIAN COMEDY and "BUDDY" / "ROAD TRIP" movie from MEXICO that played recently at the 2015 - 31st Chicago Latino Film Festival.

Three friends, Emiliano (played by José Carlos Ruiz [IMDb] [FAes]*), Benito (played by Eduardo Manzano [IMDb] [FAes]*) and Agustín (played by Luis Bayardo [IMDb] [FAes]*) embark on a road trip presumably from Mexico City [en.wikip] to Dolores Hidalgo, Guanajuato [en.wikip] [es.wikip]* to fulfill the dying wish of a fourth buddy Pedro (played by Pedro Weber 'Chatanuga' [IMDb] [FAes]*).

The film opens with Pedro, their friend, playing dominoes with them in some small neighborhood bar somewhere in the D.F., and KNOWING that "his time was near," he orders five tequilas: "But Pedro, with all the medicines that we're taking, YOU KNOW that NONE OF US can drink anymore?" "Guys, I'm not ordering them FOR US, I'm ordering them FOR ME. ;-)" -- and downing them, one by one, one ("Mmm..."), two ("Ahh.." ;-), three ("Okay, now I'm emborrachado" ;-) ;-) -- he continues:

"You know this story, I've told you it at least fifty times," -- the other three roll their eyes because they've heard this story A THOUSAND TIMES ;-) -- "THE CLOSEST I EVER CAME TO _TRUE GREATNESS_ -- [ pause for an appropriate moment of silence ;-) ] -- was ONE NIGHT, ONE CRAZY NIGHT that I spent drinking with José Alfredo Jiménez [es.wikip]*[en.wikip] (a VERY FAMOUS Mariachi singer from Dolores Hidalgo, Gto) ...

... AT THE END OF THAT NIGHT he wrote on a napkin the words to "En El Ultimo Trago" ("The last shot") which became one of his most famous songs [YouTube]
  
... and HE WROTE THE DEDICATION _TO ME_, telling me that this was THE FIRST TIME he ever wrote the song down.  And by all accounts he was right because the song only became a hit many years afterwards...

... ANYWAY ... my dying wish is -- "But you're NOT dying..." "OH YES I AM, just wait ..." -- "take that napkin with that dedication TO ME ;-) and deliver it to his museum there in Dolores Hidalgo.  Have them put it up in a prominent place, so that PEOPLE WILL SEE that dedication, WITH MY NAME ON IT, there at the bottom of napkin, after I'm dead ... "

And, finishing his "last request" to his three fellow octogenarian dominoes partners, he ... has a  heart attack, and ... dies ;-).   One heck of an "último trago" ;-) ;-)

Well, for the other three -- 80+ years old or not -- that was one heck of a dying wish and though Emiliano's ALREADY USING A WALKER ... they decide to fulfill it ;-)

The rest of the movie follows ... often VERY, VERY SLOWLY ... ;-)

This is just a wonderful (and, parents note, at times crude ;-) movie about life-long friendship!

A GREAT, GREAT JOB!


* Reasonably good (sense) translations of non-English webpages can be found by viewing them through Google's Chrome browser.

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Neruda [2014]

MPAA (UR would be PG-13)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
FilmAffinity.com/es listing*
CineChile.cl listing*

Official website

El Agente de Cine (A. García) review*
ElMostrador.cl (V. Minué Maggiolo) review*
LaNacion.cl review*
LaTercera.com (J. García) review*

Neruda [2014] [IMDb] [FAes]* [CCh.cl]* (screenplay and directed by Manuel Basoalto [IMDb] [FAes]* [CCh.cl]*) is an beautifully shot (the outdoor vistas are often spectacularly beautiful) CHILEAN film / period piece about the 1948-49 flight into exile -- 13 months from house-to-house, town-to-town, eventually on horseback over the Andes Mountains from Chile to Argentina -- of Chilean Poet / ever Leftist-then-Communist Politician later Nobel Prize for Literature winning Pablo Neruda [es.wikip]*[en.wikip] [GR] [WCat] [Amzn] [IMDb-Char] (played in the film by José Secall [IMDb] [FAes]* [CCh.cl]*).  The film played recently at the 2015 - 31st Chicago Latino Film Festival.

The director, Basoalto [IMDb] [FAes]* [CCh.cl]* had already completed a documentary series a number of years previous about Neruda's famous escape, but believed, rightly IMHO, that the subject matter deserved treatment as a biopic as well.

The reason for Neruda's need to flee Chile was of course political.  Some background:

Born Neftali Ricardo Reyes Basoalto "in the provinces" (in Parral, Chile) he began using the pseudonym Pablo Neruda after he left at sixteen for Santiago the Capital to study (French was his major) at the University of Chile.  His father was apparently opposed to "his wasting his time with writing poetry." So publishing poems under a pseudonym allowed him to publish without his father's knowledge.  And a poet he became!  By eighteen he published his famous Twenty Poems of Love and A Song of Despair (orig. Veinte poemas de amor y una canción desesperada) [1923] [GR-eng] [GR-esp] [WCat-eng] [WCat-esp] [Amzn-eng] [Amzn-esp].  By 20 he was arguably world-renowned -- as a poet!  Yet, he was also penniless.

So Neruda took a job in the Chilean diplomatic corps, serving first in then British India (in Burma and Ceylon) and eventually "moved up" to serve IN SPAIN just as the Spanish Civil War was about to begin.  That's where he got radicalized and became a lifelong Communist / Communist apologist.

After serving also in Mexico and then Paris, he eventually came back to Chile and in 1945 was elected to serve as Senator.  (It is at this point, Neruda's return to Chile and election to the Chilean Senate, that the film begins).

In 1946, Neruda was asked to serve as the CAMPAIGN MANAGER for Gabriel González Videla [en.wikip] [es.wikip]* who was running for Chilean President as part of a coalition of left-wing political parties (which the Communists were a part). 

HOWEVER soon after getting elected, Videla, expelled the Communist Party from the ruling Coalition and then pushed through the Chilean Congress a McCarthy-like law called the Law for the Permanent Defense of Democracy [en.wikip] [es.wikip]*, which among other things banned the Communist Party in Chile.  Why would Videla do this, after having Neruda, a Communist after all, ACTUALLY LEAD HIS CAMPAIGN is still fodder for dispute.  However it's assumed that pressure probably came from the United States to do so (as the Cold War was just beginning). 

In any case, in the tradition of the famous J'Accuse letter written by French writer Emile Zola in defense of Alfred Dreyfus in the 1898 French Dreyfus Affair, on January 6, 1948 Pablo Neruda -- AND THIS WAS SHOWN VERY DRAMATICALLY IN THE FILM -- rose to give his own "I Accuse" (orig. "Yo Acuso") speech in the Chilean Senate, where quoting Franklin Roosevelt's 1941 Four Freedoms speech -- where FDR postulated the Universality of the Freedom of Speech, the Freedom of Worship, the Freedom from Want, and the Freedom from Fear --  Neruda accused Videla's law of violating Chileans' rights to both the Freedom of Speech and the Freedom from Fear.

After giving the speech, since the Communist Party was already banned, Neruda had to go into hiding and the rest of the film followed...

The rest of the film includes then the process of Neruda's escape, again involving moving from safe-house to safe-house and eventually going by horseback over the Andes and into Argentina.  The film also includes reminiscences from Neruda's childhood (again he was born "in the mountains / provinces") and reminders of Neruda's continued writing during this time of escape.  During the Q&A with the director of the film, present at its screening here at the 2015 Chicago Latino Film Festival, the director noted that Neruda wrote his Canto General (1950) [GR] [WCat] [Amzn] "while on the run" at this time.

All in all, this is a very well done Chilean film about probably the most renowned Chilean who ever lived.


* Reasonably good (sense) translations of non-English webpages can be found by viewing them through Google's Chrome browser.

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Breaking the Wave (orig. Rompiendo la Ola) [2014]

MPAA (UR would be PG-13)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing
FilmAffinity.com/es listing*
SensaCine.com listing*

Breaking the Wave (orig. Rompiendo la Ola) [2014] [IMDb] (directed and cowritten by Annie Canavaggio [IMDb] along with Vicente Ferraz [IMDb]) is a fun PANAMANIAN "SURFING DOCUMENTARY" that played recently at e 2015 - 31st Chicago Latino Film Festival about the surfing community at Playa Santa Catalina in Veraguas Province, Panama.

The film clearly plays-off of the common perception that surfing (though actually having its origins among the browner-skinned Polynesians of Hawaii and the South Pacific) is today largely a "white sport."  Yet presented here is a still largely quiet surfer's paradise where most of the confident yet laid-back and smiling surfers are black, mulatto and even indigenous Panamanian locals who've actually done increasingly well international surfing competitions.  (And at the end of the film, one these local surfers became the first black surfer - at least from Panama - to ever win a sponsorship contract from one of the world's major surfboard manufacturers).

So how does the life of this Panamanian surfing community compare and contrast with the perceived life-style of surfers worldwide?  Well, that's a good part of the movie ;-)

Differences noted would include that the Panamanian locals would probably be poorer than most of their counterparts from more industrially advanced countries.  As such, while certainly loving to surf, more than a few of them interviewed were also shown working hard in construction and harvesting jobs as they noted (if at times sadly): "you can't eat by surfing."

Then, perhaps somewhat surprisingly, drugs weren't portrayed as being a big part of the local surfing subculture.  Yes, having a beer with friends, especially among the older / mentor now 40-something coaches was deemed okay.  AND packages of cocaine were shown in the documentary as actually occasionally washing onshore (after presumably having fallen off of various drug boats).  BUT the father of one of the main surfers in the film spent four years in prison after being caught trying to sell one of these kilo packages of cocaine that he found washed-up on shore one day.  As such, most of the younger local Panamanian surfers interviewed in the film appeared to equate drugs with inviting problems that none of them (or their families) really needed.

It was also quite clear that religion, both popular Catholicism and charismatic Protestantism, played a significant role in the local surfing community as well.  Almost all of the younger surfers were one or the other -- Protestant or Catholic -- and certainly their families were.

Finally, it was clear that family -- parents and brothers / sisters / cousins -- probably played the most important role in all of their lives.  Perhaps that's why they worked first and surfed when they had time.  That's why appeared to stay away from drugs -- they didn't want to give their families needless problems.  And perhaps that's why they all seemed to be either Protestant or Catholic (again that's what their families were).  FINALLY, THEY ALSO CLEARLY ENJOYED TEACHING THEIR YOUNGER BROTHERS, SISTERS, COUSINS how to surf -- even if they didn't have a board for them to use (they just drew the outline of a "board" in the sand, and had the kids "pretend" ;-)

All in all, I found this film to be A DELIGHT to watch.  It makes total sense to me that people, the world over, watching waves come in from the sea would find the prospect of surfing those waves tantalizing.  I'm just happy as pie to see that people across the world are now increasingly doing so.  Good job! ;-) 


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