This movie investigates the bloody culture of murder in Juarez that has become headline news in the United States in the last three to four years. Unfortunately, one of even modest interest in current events can learn little from it.
The two main interviewees are credentialed as "Writer" and "Research Librarian" without even an affiliation; both, however, are apparently white residents of the United States. This in itself is not a problem. However, the Writer makes a string of astonishing claims and the director makes no effort to substantiate them. For example, it is claimed that President Calderon of Mexico is using the Mexican military and federal police in a genocide against indigent Mexicans, and that he is being aided in doing so by the United States government. He speaks in a basso voice that would project profundity but instead projects vitriolic silliness.
There are repeated intercuts of a speech by Calderon with United States President Obama looking on. He speaks in broad terms of the problem and steps being taken to fix it. However, it's not clear what the purpose of these scenes really is. Possibly the purpose is to juxtapose the calm demeanor of a country's leader with the evil undertones of a world-class abuser of human rights (the before-mentioned genocide). In another clip from file footage, a grieving mother, breaking protocol, approaches a seated Calderon and levels her rage and grief at him. He is obviously affected, and in the next scene the president's wife is seen hugging and consoling the mother--apparently she's not in on the genocide secret.
Other interviewees fare a little better in their relationship to reality but yet, they too fail to tell the viewer why the killings are occurring.
The film is a little short at 90 minutes but yet has way too much filler. For example, riding around in a car at night with a reporter and a cameraman could certainly result in something interesting happening (one would suppose, with eight murders a day occurring, we are told, mostly between 9 p.m. and 11 p.m.). Yet, all we get is an interview with the reporter as a subject (!) being asked if he is scared. At one point one of these exercises does result in something happening--a street beggar treating the crew to a baton-twirling act using his crutch. Really. This is not what I paid to see.
The film touches (barely) on class issues as a possible source of the problem, but the treatment consists solely of drive-by footage of some nice-looking homes, the voice-over statement that the rich have mostly left Juarez and are living in El Paso, accompanied by another drive-by shot, this time of a generic glass-and-steel office building, presumably in El Paso but not so stated. And nothing is said of the race issue in Mexico which parallels the class structure. (Sixty percent of Mexicans are mixed-race, 30 percent are unmixed indigenous, and nine percent are white. Yet, most positions of power and fame in government and business are occupied by whites or light-skinned mixed-race.)
In another shortcoming, it is stated that the North American Free Trade Agreement is a cause of the suffering depicted. NAFTA is frequently the bugaboo of lazy investigators who are convinced that free trade between countries is wrong and must therefore be the cause of bad things. The claim might have some validity, but true to its form, the film does absolutely nothing to follow up on it.
Much the 90 minutes is stock footage from television shows--not necessarily bad, but not especially illuminating unless all one wants to see is the normal superficial TV news coverage. The reason I got off my couch to see this movie was to gain a deeper understanding of the causes of the violence and all I got was stock footage, crutch-twirling, and unsupported radical accusations.
No thought is given to the pre-Calderon murder culture. Nowadays, _every_ Juarez murder is written off as "the problem" and no consideration is given to the possibility that the pre-Calderon murder rate might have been underreported, nor to the possibility that murders are being committed between normal citizens (those not involved in the drug trade) simply because they know that they will never be caught.
A focal point of the viewer's frustration is the report (again, by file footage) of the murder of several maquiladora workers as they return from work. The murders appear to be pointless and unmotivated, yet the movie does absolutely nothing to explain--it's just another jumping off point for another rant.
And the film doesn't even believe itself. The final words spoken, almost forebodingly and even with a veiled threat, speak of the possibility of Calderon himself being killed. Really? That would be suicide then, since he is directing the action!
In terms of editing, getting talking heads, etc., this movie hits some of the notes of a real documentary and the look-and-feel is better than amateurish. Unfortunately, it packs little intellectual wallop.
