THE CITY (LA CIUDAD)
Reviewed by Harvey Karten Zeitgeist Films Director: David Riker Writer: David Riker Cast: Ricardo Cuevas, Cipriano Garcia, Silvia Goiz, Leticia Herrera, Jose Rabelo, Anthony Rivera
How do you make the pathos of a film's characters seem real? Recently, Danish filmmaker Lars von Trier issued a manifesto along with his introduction of "The Celebration," stating that the way to do this is to eliminate all notions of illusion--no special effects, no filters on the cameras, no crass editing. Another method, more tried-and-true, is the documentary, which selects actual scenes to portray a point without fictionalizing. The weakness of the first is that such a chaste approach relinquishes the incredible technology that can add zest to the dullest tale. The second is marred by an over-reliance on talking-heads and by abdicating the merits of storytelling.
In "The City," four tales of Latin-American immigrants in the U.S., director David Riker sidesteps the flaws of those methods, keeping his story candid and forthright by using mostly real people, not actors. He allows them to dramatize the hardships of the people they portray, problems centering on their being disenfranchised people from Mexico and lands south who are living in New York City. Because many of them are presumably undocumented aliens, they have difficulties finding decent jobs, and those they do find can barely keep the clothes on their backs, much less take care of people who are dependent upon them both in New York and in the home countries.
"The City" is filmed by David Riker--a documentarian who has successfully plied his trade with his first feature film--in a black-and-white neo-realist style. It's a stretch, but think of the great Italian director Roberto Rosselini who in 1945 introduced neo-realism with "Open City," a devastating depiction of the destruction wrought by World War II. In some scenes of Riker's work, particularly those filmed in the Bronx, we get the impression that these working people are in Dresden in 1945 and not in the world's greatest metropolis between 1992 and 1997 when the work was filmed.
The quartet of movies is unified by a photographer who is taking photos of an assortment of Latinos amid a fake background of sylvan scenes, a perfect irony for the lives that these people are leading. You won't find these folks jogging or riding their bikes in the Central Park that forms the canvas backdrop for the pictures, but you will locate them rather in parts of the city that seem to many New Yorkers to be invisible.
The people hauling bricks in the first story, called "Bricks," are plying their simple trade against a backdrop of Manhattan skyscrapers but they might as well be working on a Georgia chain gang. Desperate for this pack-mule work, they line up outside hiring areas and are picked up selectively by men with trucks, one of whom brusquely promises those who are culled $50 a day, only to announce on arrival at a remote location that they instead would be given only 15 cents for each brick they stack in a pile. When a wall collapses killing a worker, the men do not even know where to direct the ambulance. They are in purgatory. The story is acted poignantly by one virtually voiceless professional in the role of the contractor, Joe Rigano (you'll remember him from "Mickey Blue-Eyes") and a crew of rugged laborers who might do better if they could unite but who instead fight among themselves in their frustration.
The most heartwarming picture, the only one that gives some hope of transcendence for these unfortunate people, is "Home." A young man from the city of Puebla, Mexico (Cipriano Garcia) in New York for the first time fruitlessly tries to locate his uncle's apartment. When he cannot make sense of the huge housing project, he hears music, slips into a sweet 15 party, and dances with a sad young woman (Leticia Herrera) who is at first cautious but soon warms up to the lad when she discovers he lives in the same section of Puebla from which she came. Though the two seem to be falling in love by the minute (she invites him to spend the night in her apartment on the couch), the meeting turns out to be a bittersweet one.
In "The Puppeteer," a homeless man (Jose Rabelo) living with his 7-year-old daughter (Stephanie Viruet) in a car is unable to register the little girl in a public school since he does not have a rent receipt of phone bill to prove residence in the district. Frustrated that the lack of a piece of paper could prevent his daughter from getting an education, he becomes yet another of the invisible dispirited men who do not cause trouble but who have fallen through the cracks.
The story closes with the most highly-developed tale, "Seamstress," in which a man who is himself an immigrant (from the Far East, played by Hyoung Taek Limb) exploits the labor of Latinos in a sweatshop. When one of the workers (Silvia Goiz) needs $400 for an emergency treatment of her daughter, her fellow seamstresses and pressers--who must work quickly and without errors lest they be instantly dismissed--take up a meager collection. The boss, who has not paid the workers in a month, is pure Simon Legree, however.
David Riker, who has worked with various communities in the New York area and comes across as a sympathetic and even enraged ideologue with Old-Left politics, has filmed a labor of love. While his movie will not likely have the effect on New York's mayor and council that the Upton Sinclair had on Congress with that writer's "The Jungle," Riker proves that even the country's most liberal large city has a way to go to prove its compassion. This is an empathetic work filmed effectively in the Italian neo-realist tradition.
Not Rated. Running Time: 88 minutes. (C) 1999 Harvey Karten
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