Filed under: Drama
On the surface, Carey Fukunaga’s directorial debut, Sin Nombre, comes across as a serious exploration on the parallel themes of the struggles of illegal immigration into the United States through Mexico and the violence and barbarity of the local Mexican gangs. The honorable intentions that I’m sure were brought to this film have been lost to a dominating, clichéd, melodramatic love story. What could have been the Mexican equivalent to City of God, instead settles for a story filled with conventions and contrivances, along with three stock character protagonists, all of which equal a nice, formulaic film that would conveniently fit quite well in Hollywood.
The protagonists in question are Smiley (Kristian Ferrer), Casper (Edgar Flores), and Sayra (Paulina Gaitan). Smiley is a child of about ten who is being initiated into a local gang. This initiation mainly consists of the gang beating him up. Every member of the gang has a nickname and a bunch of tattoos. Apparently the higher up one is in the gang the more tattoos he has. The leader’s nickname should have been Queequeg. Casper is obviously another member of the gang, but after a mishap between his girlfriend and his superior gang member, followed by a similar incident between him and the same gangster, he wants out. He winds up on a train housing hopeful illegal immigrants headed for the U.S./Mexican border. Sayra, a reluctant, exhausted, Honduran teenager is on board that same train. She’s heading for the land of opportunity, specifically New Jersey. Naturally she falls in love with Casper, as all proper girls do when they see a violent gangster hoping to evade an entire gang who wants to kill him. How does Casper know that the gang’s after him? He gets a text message.
It’s the relationship between Casper and Sayra where the film becomes like countless others. Within a day and a fortnight they become eternal lovers. Romeo and Juliet were given more time than that. But what’s really peculiar in this relationship is Casper. What the hell does she see in him? Flores plays him like the totality of Brando’s wild one and Dean’s rebel. Except he strips the character of all personality, so what’s left is an excess of blank stares and shrugs.
It’s the violence in this film that’s truly disturbing, precisely for the reason that it’s not at all disturbing. When the gang first beats up Smiley I didn’t care. The camera angles prevented me from being affected. Apparently Fukunaga did not want to upset anyone watching his film about Mexican gangs. There are indeed three scenes of considerable bloodshed, but in each instance the character dies instantly, so there is no real pain, no suffering. There is even a scene that mirrors one of the most devastating scenes from City of God, a film that deals far more honestly in terms of the relationship between human nature and violence. The scene involves Smiley being forced to kill someone as part of his initiation. In City of God the similar scene was primarily about the pain of the victims, showing exactly what it means to murder someone. The incident in Sin Nombre is rather quick and painless. Smiley even gets a bit of help pulling the trigger.
Overall the film doesn’t have enough energy to keep up any level of suspense or momentum, which should be more prevalent in a story where a group of people is trying to illegally immigrate, while an allegedly vicious gang is hunting one of those persons. The score, which is one of the more generic, and deliberately manipulative scores I’ve heard in awhile, served to compromise for the film’s tonal shortcomings.
What’s the point of making a film outside of Hollywood if your only going to adhere to its basic formulas? I wouldn’t be surprised if Fukunaga’s next film is for a major studio.
-Jason Bardin