La Ciudad (The City)

La Ciudad is a very silent movie. I think the overall silence brings out a lot about what these immigrants really feel. The focus is on their faces (thus the photo studio), and on what they live through each vignette. That is how it says a lot without having to go deep into the short stories it presents. Its being black & white also helps to set the tone, one of helplessness, one of being lost. It also helps present the movie as a documentary for a mainstream audience which I think is a rather clever way to reach the targeted audience. The question is how well does it represent the latino immigrant experience? Pretty good, I think. Definitely something to see.

I thought I had seen terrible movies in my life, but this one takes the cake... It's by far the worse movie ever made and I have no idea how it won the awards that it did... Save yourselves the time and agony and watch something else, anything else...

The City is one of the most important (and true) American films yet. David Riker has found the key to perfection in non-sensationalism. He has told the rarely told truth of one of our most glamourized cities. His passion for these people shows. The courage he displays by making this film the way he wanted to, in Spanish, intensifies the beautifully filmed, emotionally moving scenes. David Riker is my hero! He is the most non-sold out director I've found. If you have the chance, SEE THIS FILM!

This is certainly not a movie for the Ahnold, Rambo, blast 'em out of the galaxy crowd. It is, rather, a spare, black and white, mise en scene depiction of Hispanic immigrants in New York City. There are four different stories, the first three ending in a somewhat frustrating, unresolved manner. The fourth story lifts the film up tremendously with a subtle, but very powerful scene that involves no dialogue or music at all. This is the type of film that is not overly exciting, but will stay with you for quite a while and has many layers of meaning that all come together at the end.

David Riker's neo-realist drama "The City" looks at the plight of Latin American immigrants in New York. Filmed in black and white, starring a mostly unknown cast, and spoken mostly in Spanish, this movie tests your attention span but makes perfectly clear how much these people struggling to survive. The only other movie that I know that draws this much attention to the immigrants' plight is Herbert Biberman's "Salt of the Earth", which Biberman made while blacklisted.

If you don't feel something for the characters, then you have no soul. As the Latin American population in the United States continues to grow, movies like this will become all the more important. Highly recommended.