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 Entertainment | April 2006 
Mexican Art-Porn Droops
 Rob Howatson - The Globe and Mail
| | Carlos Reygadas' chilly and distant gaze on his characters' nude bodies nullifies this as porn. But is it art? |
Mexican filmmaker Carlos Reygadas does not shirk from graphic sex scenes. His 2002 debut Japón set critics' tongues a waggin' with its bold tryst between a middle-aged depressive and an elderly woman. In his latest work, Battle In Heaven, he ups the flesh ante with opening and closing blow jobs that bracket, among other things, an afternoon flab smack between two of the movie's portlier characters.
The heavyweights are chauffeur Marcos and his wife, who have just learned that the baby they kidnapped has died pre-ransom. The 34-year-old director's chilly and distant gaze on his characters' nude bodies nullifies this as porn. But is it art?
Tough to say. Some of the non-sex scenes achieve remarkable intimacy. Marcos driving his boss's prostitute daughter Ana through the chaos of Mexico City is mesmerizing for its clever use of muted traffic noise, a technique that turbo-charges each word uttered in the silent SUV.
Other cinematic flourishes are merely self-indulgent, such as when Marcos has sex with Ana. Reygadas dollies out of the bedroom mid-coitus for a rooftop 360 of her quiet middle-class neighbourhood. The camera tracks back inside only after the couple has finished, but in time to witness the slovenly driver's penis droop from erection. So much for cutting away to a romantic shot of the fireplace.
The film glides smartly in places, but mostly it is a series of meticulously composed, static vignettes that attack Mexico: A gas station playing loud symphony music; rich guys urinating on luggage that they know their maids will collect; Marcos posed Sphinx-like beside his wife as she sells her clocks and jellies in the metro.
Non-pro actors deliver distractingly wooden performances and there are some clumsy bits of symbolism (i.e., cathedral bells that swing but do not toll). Ultimately the only battle in this heaven is the one between a talented, inexperienced director and his new craft. |
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