17 August 2007
Tijuana, Mexico
By Heather
The Night Buffalo (El Búfalo de la Noche)
I went to TJ today to see Diego Luna’s latest movie, The Night Buffalo. What a fantastic film! Diego and the rest of the cast really put themselves out there. I applaud their courage and commitment as entertainers, as this must not have been an easy film to make.
I don’t really want to spend my time telling you the story. I’ll just say that if you haven’t read the book, you should. You can get it in Spanish or English at http://www.amazon.com. The movie follows the book right up to the end, which they changed for the film, probably to make the ending more meaningful. Either way, it’s a dark story and the viewer ultimately realizes there can be no happy ending, regardless.
The film is shot out of order, by that I mean it’s not in chronological order (the book’s the same way). The viewer can generally understand the past versus the present by Diego’s haircut and facial hair, or lack thereof.
Everyone is naked in this movie, especially the main characters Manuel (Diego Luna) and Tania (Liz Gallardo). But not to be left out, Margarita (Irene Azuela), Rebecca (Camila Sodi) and Gregorio (Gabriel González) all get an opportunity to flash the camera with some skin.
Basically, Manuel and Tania end up having an affair behind Gregorio’s back. Gregorio is Manuel’s best friend and Tania’s boyfriend. Manuel is a bit of “playa”; a machismo guy that doesn’t want his girlfriend to cheat on him, but he can cheat on her and its okay.
After Gregorio kills himself,
Manuel is confused as all hell. He’s lost, confuses sex with love
and starts to go nutty himself. Gregorio
haunts
Manuel by leaving him a box full of cryptic messages, song lyrics
and photos. There are strange phone calls, nightmares of breathing
buffalos, earwigs, you name it. Manuel is a very unhappy soul.
In the movie Manuel also hooks up with Gregorio’s sister Margarita,
whom he’s had sex with before. Then there is a brief scene of Manuel
with Rebecca (played by Camila Sodi, his “now” girlfriend, not
then), who is a college friend of Manuel’s whom he has sex with from
time to time. (See, he's a player!)
Ironically, for the amount of nudity and sex scenes, the movie did
not feel dirty to me. It felt more serious, sensual, and it was very
well done. Or maybe I'm just used to the extra skin in foreign
films? In any case, there are some scenes where people do actually
ware clothes. And those scenes are equally as good, so is the
acting. I just can’t say enough about this movie. I think Diego
gives one of his best performances in The Night Buffalo.
A+++++, although it is not recommended for the prudish.