Movie Review: Sin Nombre
Cary Joji Fukanaga Writes, Directs Focus Features, Alliance Film
Apr 2, 2009
They are tired, dirty and hungry. They huddle in doorways, lying in the grass by the railroad tracks, trying not to be noticed by border patrols or the vicious street gangs that prey on them like feral cats tormenting mice.
Three lights pierce the gloom. A train is coming. The nameless ones tense, ready to jump onboard at a moment's notice, but still trying not to be seen. The lights slow, steam huffing, as the train pulls into the yard, slowing to a crawl.
Hordes pour out of the shadows. They leap for the train, hauling themselves onto the boxcars, clambering to the top before the locomotive begins to pick up speed once again. They are economic refugees, trying to sneak across the border into the United States to find a better life. They are the people of Sin Nombre (translated as "Nameless").
Cary Joji Fukanaga's Sin Nombre: Mexican Film About Illegal Aliens
Although it's an ensemble piece, the film ultimately focuses on two characters: Sayra (Paulina Gaitan), a young Honduran girl trying to join her family in New Jersey, and Willy (Edgar Flores), a young member of the tattooed Mara Salvatrucha gang. Unlike Sayra, Willy has problems both in front and behind: he's on the run after killing the thuggish gang leader who murdered the woman he loved and his former buddies now want him dead.
If there can only be one word to describe this flick, it would be "gutsy." Writer/director Cary Joji Fukanaga went deep to research this film, spending several weeks riding the rails in southern Mexico with other migrants, risking assault by gangs, capture by police or being crushed underneath a train. It adds
To give the flick that extra bit of realism, Fukanaga also filmed it in Spanish with subtitles. While the success of Slumdog Millionaire has eased executives' fears about Americans and subtitled films, it's still a shocking move for an American writer/director to have his first film be in a foreign language.
Unlike that Oscar-winning Danny Boyle film, there's no Cinderella story for the protagonists of Sin Nombre. Their prize is merely survival, winning through one obstacle only to figure out how to deal with the next one.
The Final Analysis
Fukanaga picked up a pair of awards for Best Direction and Best Cinematography at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival. The film justifies the awards and the hype: it's gorgeously shot and the actors (several of which have never appeared onscreen before) inhabit their roles brilliantly. It's alternately suspenseful, touching and heart-wrenching as we watch these characters struggle on each stage of their journey, battling exhaustion, thugs, the elements, border guards and their own demons.
The camera work is vivid as well: scenes of breathtaking beauty framing the squalor and desperation that these characters are trying to escape. When one person finally makes it to the US, the vast stretches of concrete and clean cities feel like an alien world.
Although the migrant experience has been detailed onscreen before, most notably in El Norte (1983), Joshua Marston's Maria Full of Grace (2004) and Patricia Riggen's 2008 film La Misma Luna, very few have shown it in all the terrifying and exhilarating detail that Sin Nombre brings to the table. It's a wonderful film and a stunning debut for writer/director Fukanaga.
It earns an 9/10.
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