Chris Knipp
05-18-2009, 07:04 PM
CARLOS CUARON: Rudo y Cursi
In and out of hicksville
This is a story about poor banana workers from central Mexico whose sudden success is illusory and whose lives go down hill, and it's played as a comedy. Carlos, in his directorial debut, is the brother of Alfonso Cuaron and the author of Y tu mama' tambien, which Alfonso directed. This brings back together childhood friends and Y tu mama' stars Diego Luna (who's Tato, nicknamed Rudo, or "rough") and Gael Garcia Bernal (who's Beto, nicknamed Cursi, or "mushy," as in sentimental).
Rudo y Cursi takes some care in the reading. Look at that snapshot* of Gael, Carlos, and Diego lighting up. Geel with his head in a bandana, Carlos in the funny hat, tousled-haired Diego with the sly grin. These are cool guys. And the actors, in the Latino world, are hotties. That is a lens through which to view what is a decidedly unglamorous film, that sometimes seems to be making fun of poor Mexicans, and often looks like a B-picture. The country world is mostly shot darkly, through blue filters, and the actors aren't highlighted but made boys in a crowd scene, Breugel-style. They are also buffoonish, and pathetic.
Tato and Beto are doing their thing in hicksville, Provincia Guerrero, when along comes Batuta (Guillermo Francella), a talent scout. For music or sport? He claims to both, but he's a double-talker. He's only there because the tire on his red convertible goes flat and he lacks a spare. So he watches a game of "futbol" and sees the two brothers, for they are brothers, though Beto is short and pretty and Tato is tall and thin with a little moustache and a sneer.
Though they're not young (in real life the actors are now 30 and 31) they're good players and Batuta picks one, only one, to take back to Mexico City. He stages a goal shot, since Tato is an arquero, a goalie, to decide who gets to go, and they cheat, but the cheating goes wrong, a sequence that will be repeated later. This movie, like Amores perros, which also starred Garcia Bernal, swarms with spicy obscenities whose picante flavor a gringo can only guess at, and with cheating, and stupidity, which also a gringo may misconstrue as pathetic when they're meant to be droll. Beto gets picked first but later Batuta comes back and brings Tato to Mexico City too, repeating all the same cliches. Batuta also speaks intentionally trite, mock-philosophical voice-over lines, pretending to know all about the world, about sport, and about women, none of which he's all that good at, because he's basically a loser too, eventually reduced to a VW bug. But everybody survives, and though Rudo and Cursi return to the provinces in disgrace, loaded with debts after a brief round of national fame, thanks to a local drug lord's marrying into the family their mother gets the nice house by the beach she dreamed of and the debts, presumably, get paid off.
Everybody admits they're essentially losers, and of humble origin. Batuta got called that, baton, because when he was attempting to be a soccer player himself his teammates on the street thought he was so bad maybe he could have done better as an orchestra leader. Likewise the fancy, sexy TV lady, Maya (Jessica Mas), seemingly inaccessible for Beto, till he becomes a soccer star and she suddenly notices him. He wastes money on her and then finds out she's dumped him when he sees her on a TV show cuddling with another soccer player. Tato is a jealous husband with serious anger management problems and a gambling habit exponentially worsened by a discovered weakness for blow. He has only lost the electric blender when he leaves his wife in the country but he manages to lose a whole lot more in Mexico City.
Beto's particular idiocy is that he thinks he must be a singer. He warbles out of tune and pumps an accordion but despite a small contract and a video arranged by Batuta of him singing Cheap Trick's "I Want You to Want Me" in Spanish, all he can get is an appearance at a small circus.
This movie might make a whole lot more sense if you are Mexican. It was a little bit lost on me, though I can't say I minded the fact there's a minimum of "futbol" depicted onscreen. This is a film about Mexico's national delusions and its contradictions, beautifully exemplified by the two thugs who threaten to kill Beto if he doesn't turn around his losing streak, and then ask him for autographs for their daughters. One revelation is that while Garcia Bernal is charismatic and the New Yorker once called him "impossibly handsome," Diego Luna is more convincing and more embedded in his role. As the "rough" Rudo, he's utterly different from the soft, aristocratic Tenoch of Y tu mama' tambien. He's hard, abrupt, almost scary here. Carlos Cuaron seems to know what he's doing even if I don't; we should give him a chance to do more. Y tu mama' was the more conventionally artistic film, more successfully designed to play to the global audience. But these three hip Mexican guys deserve credit for turning inward and doing something for the home audience. It sounds to my untutored ear as though their spicy Mexican vernacular has lost none of its pungency. I wish I were a little more in on the joke.
*http://www.iwatchstuff.com/2007/06/19/ytumamatambien.jpg
In and out of hicksville
This is a story about poor banana workers from central Mexico whose sudden success is illusory and whose lives go down hill, and it's played as a comedy. Carlos, in his directorial debut, is the brother of Alfonso Cuaron and the author of Y tu mama' tambien, which Alfonso directed. This brings back together childhood friends and Y tu mama' stars Diego Luna (who's Tato, nicknamed Rudo, or "rough") and Gael Garcia Bernal (who's Beto, nicknamed Cursi, or "mushy," as in sentimental).
Rudo y Cursi takes some care in the reading. Look at that snapshot* of Gael, Carlos, and Diego lighting up. Geel with his head in a bandana, Carlos in the funny hat, tousled-haired Diego with the sly grin. These are cool guys. And the actors, in the Latino world, are hotties. That is a lens through which to view what is a decidedly unglamorous film, that sometimes seems to be making fun of poor Mexicans, and often looks like a B-picture. The country world is mostly shot darkly, through blue filters, and the actors aren't highlighted but made boys in a crowd scene, Breugel-style. They are also buffoonish, and pathetic.
Tato and Beto are doing their thing in hicksville, Provincia Guerrero, when along comes Batuta (Guillermo Francella), a talent scout. For music or sport? He claims to both, but he's a double-talker. He's only there because the tire on his red convertible goes flat and he lacks a spare. So he watches a game of "futbol" and sees the two brothers, for they are brothers, though Beto is short and pretty and Tato is tall and thin with a little moustache and a sneer.
Though they're not young (in real life the actors are now 30 and 31) they're good players and Batuta picks one, only one, to take back to Mexico City. He stages a goal shot, since Tato is an arquero, a goalie, to decide who gets to go, and they cheat, but the cheating goes wrong, a sequence that will be repeated later. This movie, like Amores perros, which also starred Garcia Bernal, swarms with spicy obscenities whose picante flavor a gringo can only guess at, and with cheating, and stupidity, which also a gringo may misconstrue as pathetic when they're meant to be droll. Beto gets picked first but later Batuta comes back and brings Tato to Mexico City too, repeating all the same cliches. Batuta also speaks intentionally trite, mock-philosophical voice-over lines, pretending to know all about the world, about sport, and about women, none of which he's all that good at, because he's basically a loser too, eventually reduced to a VW bug. But everybody survives, and though Rudo and Cursi return to the provinces in disgrace, loaded with debts after a brief round of national fame, thanks to a local drug lord's marrying into the family their mother gets the nice house by the beach she dreamed of and the debts, presumably, get paid off.
Everybody admits they're essentially losers, and of humble origin. Batuta got called that, baton, because when he was attempting to be a soccer player himself his teammates on the street thought he was so bad maybe he could have done better as an orchestra leader. Likewise the fancy, sexy TV lady, Maya (Jessica Mas), seemingly inaccessible for Beto, till he becomes a soccer star and she suddenly notices him. He wastes money on her and then finds out she's dumped him when he sees her on a TV show cuddling with another soccer player. Tato is a jealous husband with serious anger management problems and a gambling habit exponentially worsened by a discovered weakness for blow. He has only lost the electric blender when he leaves his wife in the country but he manages to lose a whole lot more in Mexico City.
Beto's particular idiocy is that he thinks he must be a singer. He warbles out of tune and pumps an accordion but despite a small contract and a video arranged by Batuta of him singing Cheap Trick's "I Want You to Want Me" in Spanish, all he can get is an appearance at a small circus.
This movie might make a whole lot more sense if you are Mexican. It was a little bit lost on me, though I can't say I minded the fact there's a minimum of "futbol" depicted onscreen. This is a film about Mexico's national delusions and its contradictions, beautifully exemplified by the two thugs who threaten to kill Beto if he doesn't turn around his losing streak, and then ask him for autographs for their daughters. One revelation is that while Garcia Bernal is charismatic and the New Yorker once called him "impossibly handsome," Diego Luna is more convincing and more embedded in his role. As the "rough" Rudo, he's utterly different from the soft, aristocratic Tenoch of Y tu mama' tambien. He's hard, abrupt, almost scary here. Carlos Cuaron seems to know what he's doing even if I don't; we should give him a chance to do more. Y tu mama' was the more conventionally artistic film, more successfully designed to play to the global audience. But these three hip Mexican guys deserve credit for turning inward and doing something for the home audience. It sounds to my untutored ear as though their spicy Mexican vernacular has lost none of its pungency. I wish I were a little more in on the joke.
*http://www.iwatchstuff.com/2007/06/19/ytumamatambien.jpg