ON THE SILVER SCREEN: "CARANCHO" LACKS DRIVE

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By Brian Lafferty

 

April 16, 2011 (San Diego) – Carancho is not a good film, nor is it a bad film. It tells a decent story in dire need of pep and zip. It stars two appealing actors in Ricardo Darín and Martina Gusman but they are trapped in a movie that suffers from terminal perfunctoriness.

 

The story isn’t the issue. Darín (the star of last year’s Best Foreign Language Film Oscar winner The Secret in Their Eyes) is Sosa, a lawyer who recently lost his license to practice law. He resorts to working for an unscrupulous law firm specializing in scamming insurance companies and car accident victims. He falls in love with Lujan (Gusman), an attractive but perpetually weary EMT and the two embark on a love affair.

 

The movie opens with black and white still photographs of car crash aftermaths and strewn bodies. The opening titles explain that thousands of people die in car accidents each year in Argentina.

 

Carancho may be about car crashes (which are few and far between) and may be primarily set in ambulances and hospitals but it doesn’t have any drama.

 

The story is interesting but director Pablo Trapero makes a huge mistake. He encases the movie’s events and characters in a matter-of-fact tone. On paper it may have looked like a good move. In practice, however, the movie and it’s characters’ perfunctory nature and attitude becomes its undoing. It doesn’t work even within the universe of the film, where car crashes are as common as houseflies.

 

I wasn’t expecting scenes like flat liners being shocked a la most TV medical dramas. Nor was I looking for CPR being performed in dramatic fashion. These and other medical drama clichés are mostly absent, thank goodness.

 

The routine manner in which hospital scenes are conducted removes drama from every scene. It isn’t excitement I seek but urgency. Sure car crashes are routine but hospitals and humdrum don’t mix. I’ve seen more drama from St. Elsewhere.

 

There is one scene that demonstrates what I’m looking for. Carancho certainly could have used more like it. At one point Lujan treats two men in the E.R. for injuries sustained in a fight. When one learns the other is in the room, a fight breaks out. It escalates to the point of chaos, as their respective gang members get involved. A gunshot, heard outside, silences everyone.

 

Maybe this scene could be found on TV medical dramas, but Trapero separates the line between the small screen and the big screen. The scene is filmed in two long takes, with only a jump cut separating them. The camera is handheld but eschews herky-jerky camera movement in favor of something gentler.

 

This works on two levels. The first is that the gentle camera movement makes scenes much more coherent. The second is that longer takes increase tension in ways that traditional cutting doesn’t capture.

 

Most of the movie is shot in long takes. Trapero minimizes cutting, usually reserving it for when the action moves from one scene to the next. Traditional continuity editing is mostly absent, which actually helped me maintain some degree of interest.

 

Carancho devolves three-quarters of the way through into a string of clichés, including having Lujan attacked and Sosa seeking revenge (trust me, this sort of thing always happens in these movies). It ends in a shootout, which is filmed in one take, the last shot of the movie.  You don't get a cookie for guessing what happens next.

 

Carancho is currently playing at the Landmark Hillcrest.

 


A Strand Releasing release. Director: Pablo Trapero. Writers: Alejandro Fadel, Martín Mauregui, Santiago Mitre, and Pablo Trapero. Cinematography: Julián Apezteguia. Cast: Ricardo Darín, Martina Gusman, Carlos Weber, José Luis Arias, Loren Acuña, Gabriel Alimrón, and José Manuel Espeche. 107 minutes. In Spanish with English subtitles. Unrated.

 


Brian can be reached at Brian@eastcountymagazine.org. You can also follow him on Twitter: @BrianLaff.

 


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