Opening your film with a quote from Marcel Proust is certainly a choice, and “This Is Not Berlin” does its best to back the bold move. In his fourth narrative feature, Mexican filmmaker Hari Sama paints a vivid, if dizzying, portrait of his hometown, Mexico City circa 1986: There’s a steady stream of music, art, and literary references; broadly painted caricatures of youth searching for identity; hypnotic montages of political performance art; and full-frontal male nudity.
Using the underground avant-garde art scene as its backdrop and a wayward teenage boy as its protagonist, “This Is Not Berlin” renders the follies of youth through a kaleidoscopic phantasma of sex, drugs, and rock ‘n roll. Despite all the compelling decoration, however, there are few surprises.
The story follows Carlos (Xabiani Ponce De León), a fatherless teen who watches his little brother as his mother (“Roma” star Marina de Tavira) stays in bed hungover all day.
Using the underground avant-garde art scene as its backdrop and a wayward teenage boy as its protagonist, “This Is Not Berlin” renders the follies of youth through a kaleidoscopic phantasma of sex, drugs, and rock ‘n roll. Despite all the compelling decoration, however, there are few surprises.
The story follows Carlos (Xabiani Ponce De León), a fatherless teen who watches his little brother as his mother (“Roma” star Marina de Tavira) stays in bed hungover all day.
- 8/10/2019
- by Jude Dry
- Indiewire
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