Heli

This is a brutal Mexican film from director Amat Escalante. I took a shot at it based on his movie, The Untamed. I thought it was a creative entry into the horror genre. Heli is a reality based on the real life drug wars in Mexico. A twelve year-old girl, Estela, has chosen a seventeen year-old as her boyfriend; a really bad choice in her young life. Her brother gets caught in the middle of a battle over some stolen cocaine with horrific consequences. A torture scene is beyond the one in Reservoir Dogs. I found it to move slowly throughout the second half and the ending is not exactly uplifting.

'Heli' begins as a touch portrait of the life of a Mexican family; but turns into something darker when they fall into the path of a murderous gang of drug dealers. The film's third section charts what happens afterwards, and is arguably the least satisfactory portion of the movie: it's not that the film is unconvincing, but it's unclear what is added beyond what one might have expected. The ambiguous mood of the ending is arguably a sign of failure rather than success: of a film uncertain of its own point. What is good, on the other hand, is the warm and naturalistic acting, and a believable portrait of everyday dreams and their ending.

A dark and twisted tale set in Mexico with beautiful cinematography. It might be very hard to watch for its long takes and some incredibly disturbing scenes.

"Heli" tells the tragic story of main character (Heli), a teenager, and his sister's boyfriend, a soldier, who gets Heli's family in trouble when he tries to steal some cocaine.

The movie was pretty slow for the first two acts, its up until the third act that the action starts. I did admire the technical aspects of it (the cinematography), but it wasn't really anything special as the critics are saying. It felt like they were trying to emulate what Carlos Reygadas does in his films, but I did get what they meant when they called it unflinching.

It was really heartbreaking to watch, I wouldn't recommend it to anyone for the brutal violence and animal cruelty it contains. I would've liked it a lot better if they would've hurried up with the story by editing a couple of scenes out, had the actors showed a little more emotion, or had the film made a more satiric approach like "El Infierno".

As I said, I wouldn't recommend it to anyone, at least not to watch it in a movie theater, but if you're looking for an artsy, realistic crime story you might like it if you enjoyed movies similar to "Irreversible", "Traffic", "Despues de Lucia", "The Hunt", or "Amour".

a minimalistic film. a simple story. a dark moment. and the fall of an universe. all in right doses. all convincing, dramatic and impressive. the only problem - the generosity of theme who reduced Heli as a moral manifesto. after the lost of Estela, the rhythm seems be reduced for analysis of trauma. the key moment is only shadow for torture and corruption of police and the search of sense of young family. a story who seems be coherent becomes a sort of improvisation. the image is surrogate for acting. each scene from the last part seems be fight for invent purpose of the first part. a good film, off course. for message. for the bitter taste. for drama. for exploration of crisis. but far to be great.

Amat Escalante won the Best Director prize at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival and it's easy to see why. "Heli" is an absolutely brilliant and utterly uncompromising study of crime and poverty filmed with a documentary-like precision that makes its scenes of violence virtually unwatchable, (including a scene where a boy's genitals are set on fire). At its core are several extraordinary performances by a young cast who inhabit their roles so completely it's impossible to tell where the actor ends and the character begins. Heli is an 'outlaw' not in any criminal sense, (he is totally innocent), but in the sense that he exists outside the fringes of society and is sucked into a criminal underworld by circumstances totally outside his control, (his young sister's boyfriend has hidden drugs stolen from a drugs cartel inside Heli's home). This is humanist cinema but set in a place almost devoid of humanity. It's frightening, bleak and deeply disturbing but also essential viewing. A masterpiece