Carancho

Knowing Pablo Trapero's previous works, I found myself thinking (three quarters into the movie) "Wow, it seems the guy lost it". Not a bad movie itself, good, strong, structured script, plenty of bad guys who are bad only to make a living but otherwise understand their victims' problems and motivations, but afflicted by some lack of style, narrative rhythm and, last but not least, a very poor acting and voice management by the female lead, Martina Gusman.

Otherwise beautiful,sexy and well planted in front of the contained, every-year-more-Arab-looking Darín, the conflicted, substance-sustained heroine (pun intended) fails to show the downfall of a reputation-seeking doctor, trapped in a war which is not hers, anchored to a love she didn't ask for and, nevertheless, makes part of the cruel disintegration of her world.

The nervous, shaking camera style of Trapero in this flick, adds tension to the tale but fails to remark some important dramatic points. He misses, too, regarding to acting direction, allowing some of the actors —not all, granted— to deploy "methodic" works (in the sense of Actor's Studio ones) which do more damage than good to the development of the plot.

All said, "Carancho" adds nothing to the brilliant Trapero's career, far away from his brilliant "Mundo Grúa" and "El bonaerense". Fairly enough, this one can be considered just one lesser work.

Worth watching? If you like claustrophobic, dark, miserable, sordid crime movie, but with not that good acting and directing, yes. If this isn't the case, look for Adrián Caetano's "Un oso rojo".

I consider Ricardo Darin is one of the best actors in the world. Period. He has been approached to become a "hollywood star" "a la Banderas and Bardem", but refused to. He is very OK in his native Argentina, and has been in four movies during five years. Trapero is a top-notch scriptwriter and director. Notwithstanding the emotional anxiety or even repulsion that the story itself and some scenes may convey, this is a phenomenal work of art film, cinematography, acting, direction, design and clothing. The romance between these two souls (one, dishonest, the other, weird and low self-esteem)is believable, and adds some suppleness to an otherwise very twisted and somewhat creepy story.

After watching this film last night, i can say a couple of things that come to my mind.

• Has a good script, but it's "short" and therefore they make some scenes too long, with a pace too slow, to get a movie with a minimum lenght. It could been 20 min shorter, easily.

• The dark mood of the story is well placed: depressing and dangerous. No complaints here. They make also a good job on showing the daytime differences affecting the characters.

What saves this movie is Ricardo Darin's acting and the last scenes of the movie.

In Buenos Aires, Sosa (Ricardo Darin) is a lawyer that has lost his license and works in a corrupt foundation, chasing in public hospitals and police stations victims of traffic accidents to claim their insurance rights. Dr. Lujan (Martina Gusman) is a young drug-addicted doctor that has come from the provinces and works in an ambulance and in the emergency service of a public hospital. When Sosa meets Lujan, he falls in love for her and tries to recover his license and move to the provinces to star a new life. But he is trapped to the corrupt system and the mafia does not let him go.

"Carancho" is a gloomy romance about the mafia of accident and insurance in Argentina. The story of a man that can not set free from his past and drags a young doctor to the underworld is engaging, but the irony and the dark humor of the conclusion does not work and is very disappointing. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Abutres" ("Voltures")

This movie is as perfect as any contemporary movie can be perfect nowadays. The uncompromising plot shows the very somber underside of the insurance business in all its corruption, corruption found in any other big business, as we are getting to know more and more every day just by reading the world news.

They show it really as mafia business.

Corrupt lawyers, corrupt police, corrupt doctors. Everybody and his grandmother is corrupt!! A very dark, very stark movie.

Quite-quite depressing to watch, but so very well done that it grabs you from the very beginning and doesn't let go. Road traffic in the big, polluted city, is the major protagonist, the core of the story, and it is pack and parcel of many outdoor scenes where the interminable string of vehicles running with their noise and pollution are a permanent reminder that every few minutes, inevitably, some accident will occur.

The music is so perfect following the story that just now I realize that there must have been music, because I don't remember any!!

The traffic accident victims, their pain, their waiting for an ambulance lying on the bare cement of the street, maybe with broken bones, in awful pain, any minute of waiting time an atrocious agony, and the ambulance taking forever to arrive..., to me those were intolerable scenes because I was a victim of accidents too and the whole nightmarish thing came back to my mind.

All the hospital scenes were PERFECT.

And the dismal public hospitals, with stained doors (dirt), lack of supplies, lack of doctors and nurses...,and the few available (for too many patients), dead tired without sleep due to so much overwork and underpaid.

No wonder then that they could make horrible mistakes! It couldn't be more depressing. Maybe it's my problem, but I prefer to see a comedy nowadays.

The length of this movie is PERFECT, not a minute too long, not a minute too short. The editing and the camera work just couldn't be better. All the actors sheer perfection too.

Only one question bothers me when it comes to script logic. At the very end, who was driving the white pick up? Because as far as I understood, Darin's character didn't have reliable friends to count on. It's the only flaw that I could notice in the whole movie.

Excellent, a truly excellent film.