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 Sin
Nombre is the first feature by director Cary Joji Fukunaga, a young
Californian who became fascinated by the subject of the trials of Latin
American immigrants whilst making a short film called Victoria Para
Chino. Fukunaga enlarged on that concept, combining Victoria’s central
theme of the hardships of Latino immigrants with a story about the
chilling realities of life as a young man in a Mexican gang, resulting
in a picture that’s as beautiful as it is brutal.
In his small town in Tapachula,
Mexico, Willy has an admirer. A 12-year old boy follows in the
footsteps of the older teen, emulating everything he does, including
joining the resident gang, the Mara Salvatrucha, and after a hard fought
and bloody initiation, the 12-year old boy is renamed Smiley. A law
unto themselves, the gang rules their small corner of the world with no
fear of the police and a flexible code of honour that doesn’t hesitate
at dispensing cruel punishment to rival gang members. Neither does it
shrink at exacting revenge on one of their own after an incident between
Willy and the gang’s nightmarishly frightening leader, Lil Mago.
Immediately after carelessly destroying the one thing Willy cares about,
Lil Mago - in a tragically short-sighted choice of wingmen - orders
Smiley and Willy to accompany him to rob a trainload of desperate
émigrés. One of those being rolled by Lil Mago and his homies is Sayra,
a young Honduran teenager, whose long lost father has turned up with a
scheme to sneak back into America, giving his daughter the better life
he enjoyed with a new family before he was deported. Apparently,
prospects in Honduras are so dim that he will risk both their lives
squatting in train yards, dodging the border patrol and brutal muggings,
while balancing on top of a train for days in torrential downpours to
make it across the U.S. border. At the very moment it looks as if the
poor family is going to lose everything, they are rescued by a most
unlikely hero after Willy makes a desperate and irrevocable choice.
Willy’s actions make him an outlaw to his gang and he is utterly
friendless except for the tentative hand offered by the girl he saved.
Like pulling a thorn from the paw of a lion, Sayra approaches the
hunted, wounded boy, believing in her new champion while everyone else
avoids him as a murderous thug. Sayra even abandons her own flight to
help Willy survive the gauntlet of gangland the train crosses through.
Both teens have given up their respective families on this quest that’s
turned out the way neither could have expected and each needs the other
to find a new future and leave their old lives and regrets behind.
Raw and naturalistic
performances are the hallmark of this wonderful film. Edgar Flores as
Willy smoulders with the same laid-back anti-hero intensity of 1960’s
Steve McQueen. Flores’ dialog-light performance is written through eyes
that have seen way too much pain for such a young man. While Willy is a
character that shouldn’t be romanticised, Flores makes us understand why
Sayra falls for her one-time assailant like a ton of bricks. Paulina
Gaitan’s portrayal of Sayra is also achieved beautifully with little
verbiage. Gaitan’s hesitant glances and awkward postures capture the
girl whose world is turned upside down by a father she never knew and a
future she’s ambivalent about until she meets Willy, who at once becomes
the irresistible teenage lure of bad boy, idol, saviour and victim.
Seen by Fukunaga as his
version of a Western, beautiful John Ford-inspired landscapes of lush
forests and regal mountainsides mark the train’s progress through Mexico
in stunning counterpoint to Willy’s gory existence as a gang member or
Sayra’s tin shack poverty. The unexpectedly lovely scenery makes the
violence of the gangs who live in these surroundings and the daily
terrors faced by the vulnerable immigrants even more incomprehensible.
Fukunaga doesn’t glamourise the Mexican gangs; we’re shown the depths of
ugliness and brutality that these young men will sink to defending an
allotted number of streets from other gang members while preying on
innocent civilians and turning on each other at the first whiff of
insurrection. The real horror is that for the very young children
around the gangs, the members are looked to as beacons of strength and
protection. Even baby-faced Smiley is perceived with a chilling awe
once his playground friends catch sight of the new gun he’s given to
murder his former idol. There is a hopelessness permeating Sin Nombre,
which is the enemy of any good intention; love must be hidden, freedom
comes with deadly costs and the murder of friends and loved ones is
treated as just another day in the gang. It’s that dire existence that
makes the possibility that Willy the thug could leave the wreck of his
past behind and dream of a future for the first time through Sayra’s
belief in him so compelling.
Sin Nombre isn’t easy to
watch, it’s as raw as a punch to the gut and just as brutal, but it is
also a truly beautiful film, full of wonderful performances and
brilliant, articulate direction. It’s a stunning first-time feature and
an amazing film that shouldn’t be missed.
~ The Lady Miz Diva
March 11th, 2009
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