This weekend I had the pleasure of watching another critically acclaimed independent movie that was the exact opposite of Albert Nobbs. Miss Bala is thrilling, ferocious, alive, and speaks to today in a way that few Hollywood movies even attempt to. While the Oscars pathetically role around in past nostalgia for bygone eras with nominees like The Artist, they unjustly ignored Miss Bala in the “Best Foreign Film” category. My hope is that I can encourage just a handful of people to see it because it is absolutely one of last year’s best films.
What Works: This movie takes the deceptively simple tale of a Spanish beauty queen contestant wannabe who gets (unwillingly) mixed up with a Mexican drug cartel and uses that to tell the larger story of all of Mexico since the drug wars broke out. I won’t spoil all of the movie’s twists and turns but it is unrelentingly excellent at sucking us into thrilling situation after thrilling situation (even people who don’t think they care much about Mexico’s drug violence will get swept up not long after the first suspense sequence) and for so accurately capturing the confusion that keeps swirling around the conflicts. The title character is never sure who is who or what ulterior a cop may have in helping her or exactly what she’s being asked to do on the cartel’s behalf until it’s too late. The movie never leaves her point of view and so we’re kept guessing at what turns will await her next as bits and pieces of information are given to us to put together like a puzzle. The film even casts its central villain exactly right, with a drug cartel enforcer who looks not like some polished millionaire hit man, but as an ordinary rural type who keeps getting away because he can so excellently blend into a crowd.
What Doesn’t Work: What, being the most realistic depiction ever of the violence, corruption, and general confusion in Mexico isn’t enough for you?
What I Would Have Done Differently: Told people that were going into “One for the Money” or some such other bullshit time waster to go see this film instead while at the theater…and then promptly waited for them to look at me like I was crazy. But the ten people in the country who saw this film this weekend will know I’m not crazy, and it really is that good.