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| Cannes 2013: The Golden Dream – review | |
| (7 months later) | |
| Even when Ken Loach doesn't have a film in competition in Cannes, his influence is still keenly felt. Spanish director Diego Quemada-Diez was a camera assistant on Loach's Carla's Song, Land and Freedom and Bread and Roses, and there is something very Loachian in this tough, absorbing, suspenseful drama showing in the Un Certain Regard section about three Guatemalan kids trying illegally to cross the Mexican border into the US. | Even when Ken Loach doesn't have a film in competition in Cannes, his influence is still keenly felt. Spanish director Diego Quemada-Diez was a camera assistant on Loach's Carla's Song, Land and Freedom and Bread and Roses, and there is something very Loachian in this tough, absorbing, suspenseful drama showing in the Un Certain Regard section about three Guatemalan kids trying illegally to cross the Mexican border into the US. |
| He has avowedly stuck to Loach's realist directing style: shooting in narrative sequence and using a semi-improvisatory approach on location. It is interesting that while British directors such as Andrea Arnold and Clio Barnard have hyper-evolved the Loach idiom into beautifully realised and photographed dramas of naturalism, Quemada-Diez is arguably closer to the gritty, grainy original. | He has avowedly stuck to Loach's realist directing style: shooting in narrative sequence and using a semi-improvisatory approach on location. It is interesting that while British directors such as Andrea Arnold and Clio Barnard have hyper-evolved the Loach idiom into beautifully realised and photographed dramas of naturalism, Quemada-Diez is arguably closer to the gritty, grainy original. |
| The title comes from a Mexican ballad, Jaula de Oro, about the despair of those Mexicans who have actually made it into the US, but find it a "golden cage" because America accepts illegals' cheap labour – all the cooks and gardeners and office-cleaners – without allowing them the proper residency papers they need to rise beyond the faceless servant class. Despite this, the US is still a magnet for the poor of Latin America. | The title comes from a Mexican ballad, Jaula de Oro, about the despair of those Mexicans who have actually made it into the US, but find it a "golden cage" because America accepts illegals' cheap labour – all the cooks and gardeners and office-cleaners – without allowing them the proper residency papers they need to rise beyond the faceless servant class. Despite this, the US is still a magnet for the poor of Latin America. |
| Quemada-Diez has found three excellent non-professional actors for his lead roles. Brandon López and Karen Martínez play Juan and Sara, two kids who are desperate to get out of Guatemala, along with a young Indian boy they meet, Chauk (Rodolfo Domínguez). With some US dollar bills sewn secretly into their jeans, they plan on hopping boxcars and riding the rails up through Mexico and then over the border into California, this last part requiring them to work their passage by volunteering as drug mules for the gangs running heroin through secret crossing points. At every stage, these vulnerable teenagers face danger and almost certain death from predatory criminals to whom their young lives are worth less than zero. | Quemada-Diez has found three excellent non-professional actors for his lead roles. Brandon López and Karen Martínez play Juan and Sara, two kids who are desperate to get out of Guatemala, along with a young Indian boy they meet, Chauk (Rodolfo Domínguez). With some US dollar bills sewn secretly into their jeans, they plan on hopping boxcars and riding the rails up through Mexico and then over the border into California, this last part requiring them to work their passage by volunteering as drug mules for the gangs running heroin through secret crossing points. At every stage, these vulnerable teenagers face danger and almost certain death from predatory criminals to whom their young lives are worth less than zero. |
| There is something very moving about the desperate courage shown by Juan, Sara and Chauk as they battle northwards. Sara has prudently decided to disguise herself as a boy called "Oswaldo" by cutting her hair, wearing a cap and taping up her chest under her shapeless T-shirt. It creates a poignant romantic tension and there is even a tender sort of Jules et Jim frisson between the three of them. But to those hoping for a relaxing or romantic outcome, La Jaula de Oro has nothing to offer but grim reality. It is a very substantial movie, with great compassion and urgency. | There is something very moving about the desperate courage shown by Juan, Sara and Chauk as they battle northwards. Sara has prudently decided to disguise herself as a boy called "Oswaldo" by cutting her hair, wearing a cap and taping up her chest under her shapeless T-shirt. It creates a poignant romantic tension and there is even a tender sort of Jules et Jim frisson between the three of them. But to those hoping for a relaxing or romantic outcome, La Jaula de Oro has nothing to offer but grim reality. It is a very substantial movie, with great compassion and urgency. |
| • This article was amended on Tuesday 29 April 2014. The Golden Cage was originally called The Golden Dream (or La Juala de Oro). The has been changed on this article. | |
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