Glue

The Argentinian, GLUE (2006), brought me back memories of long hot summer days of just roaming around your hood, seeking distractions from the harsh realities. On this journey we follow the mischievous and unsettling, Lucas (another fine performance from Biscayart who was astounding in BPM). Apart from family issues and deciphering his sexuality, he enjoys glue and Violent Femmes. Director, Alexis Dos Santos, goes for the observational touch, allowing the actors to improvise and events to unfold naturally. The movie plays out like the aimlessly Lucas, with no real direction or purpose, but that of understanding the complexities of dealing with what is on offer in life as a teenager.

I've recently seen this movie at the International Film Festival Rotterdam and I must say I was pleasantly surprised by this movie.

Glue is a movie about Lucas, a fifteen year old boy living in a desert town in Patagonia ( Argentina) and his friends Nacho and Andrea. Lucas' parents' relationship is pretty unstable, but he doesn't want to be confronted with it. So he decides to spend his time hanging out with his friends, just talking about life and experimenting with drugs and sex.

Glue is a beautiful film about coming of age in the windy, desert-like outskirts of Patagonia. This movie is filmed with a very low budget and is very minimalistic, but it nevertheless succeeds to present very beautifully shot images in which we are granted a peek into the life of teenagers growing up. All the major themes are represented: Love, sex, drugs and music. This movie presents a universally identifiable view on teenagers.

If you have also seen this movie and enjoyed it, I recommend watching 'temporada de patos'. It is like a lighter version of this movie.

I saw this film as it premiered at the Rotterdam Festival. It is a beautifully judged rendering of a teenager's dysfunctional life at home and sexual experimentation with friends. Every scene is perfectly pitched and rife with playful directorial invention such as the main character's (Lucas?) idle toying with the 'monkey with banana' toy in the girl's bedroom and the 'open/closed' game and his mother's English lesson earlier - there are many examples. The direction of the subject matter is fresh, sensitive, mature and never contrived, indulgent or heavy handed. The camera work is some of the best DV work I've ever seen, artful, free, fluid and instinctive.

Most impressive is how every role is perfectly cast, particularly the teenagers (although I may have had initial reservations about the father, I was sufficiently convinced by the end). The central character is realised by a soulful performance from the beautiful quirky looking actor. He has the most subtly expressive face, at once mischievous and vulnerable.

It is a fine fearless debut brimming with talent, good taste and a big beating heart that transcends it's meagre budget.

Although not specifically stated, the film is set in Neuquen, Argentina's "outback" in what is most likely the 1980s (judging from the music) or possibly the 90s. So, no cell-phones, web-cams or any of the modern amenities one would have expected of kids today. Instead, we see a very raw, realistic look at bored, awkward kids in what appear to be their early teens. I have to be honest that I will watch almost any story about Argentina. However, given the tendency towards shock-value in most modern films, I wasn't surprised by the constant, unfortunate references to masturbation (yes...we get it...teens do that. But why the constant need to emphasize it? Nothing new there). For me, the redeeming side was the interaction between the three protagonists...that is, when they weren't groping each other. In fact, I was honestly put off by the blatant exploitation of the female protagonist's body, and had to check to see how old she was at the time it was made (apparently 20, but still...I found it unsettling as they made her look WAY too young). I can say this film kept my interest, but then again, as I said previously, I'll watch almost anything that comes from Argentina.

If the point of the movie was suburban teenagers bored to distraction, then it achieved its purpose quite well. The problem with this is it also bores the viewer to distraction. Telling a story cinematically doesn't achieve its end with visual gimmicks alone like cross processed film and home movie additions without backing the story up with dialog that the viewer (those over 15 years of age) can relate to. This type of adolescent story has been done over and over again and for me, this film doesn't achieve anywhere near the rating this site has given it.

The story itself seems to meander at its own pace using the absence of dialog to set the mood. In a sense, this seems to be in step with the emotional life of teenagers where dialog is at a minimum and the expression of emotion is not fully formed. This was a realistic way of portraying the subjects and the kids did a good job of bringing this off.