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21 January 2007
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Park City, United States - Friday (January 19, 2007) was the night of the buffalo. The film directed by Venezuelan Jorge Hernández, produced by Guillermo Arriaga and starring Diego Luna and Liz Gallardo, took over the Egyptian Theatre and during 97 minutes showed a powerful erotic thriller that conquered the public and the reviewer.
Minutes before 21:00 (9:00 PM), the spectators made a long line to enter the place and movement began when the cast of The Night Buffalo appeared by the main street, walking towards the cinema.
But Diego did not come alone. He was accompanied by a powerful Mexican gang made up of his father Alejandro Luna and his friends José Maria Yazpik, Jesús Ochoa, Pablo Cruz (his associate in Canana) and Daniel Gómez, the producer of Festen. Also assisting were actors Armando Hernández and Iliana Fox, Yazpik’s girlfriend.
“I am very excited, The Night Buffalo is a character that
cost me a lot and with whom I am very satisfied,” expressed the
Charolastra at the entrance of the place. Drunkards of cinema Guillermo Arriaga (Amores perros, Babel), who came in company of his wife and children, said that he didn’t even know if the Golden Globe hangover was finished, but was ready to celebrate that the adaptation of his novel inaugurates the World Dramatic Competition in Sundance.
“Seven years of my life are dedicated to this project, which today takes shape in this world premiere. I come from the Golden Globes (awards), although I did not drink, I feel a hangover, but it makes me very happy. I’d like this cinematographic drunkenness to continue longer,” expressed the writer, who together with Jorge Hernández adapted his novel to a film script.
“I am very thrilled to be here. This movie represents a very long change; I worked with an army of people who believed in The Buffalo… I never thought to come to Sundance, but now when we are here. I just want to invite them to join the trip and enjoy it,” he added as a welcome.
The movie started with the night image of a buffalo, accompanied by the chords of the music of The Mars Volta made for the film. Further on, the voice of Alejandro Fernández was heard interpreting the main topic, which was composed by Aleks Syntek.
The Night Buffalo, which will be distributed by 20th Century Fox in Mexico, narrates Manuel's story (Diego Luna), who turns out to be chased by ghosts and the women of his newly deceased, schizophrenic friend Gregorio (played by Gabriel González).
An hour and a half later a strong applause flooded the cinema after the lights were lit and a brief meeting of questions and answers was initiated. Actors, producers, directors and musicians rose to the platform while receiving the first big applause of the festival. The questions, answered all by Arriaga, turned to the change that Diego suffers on screen (from young man to adult) and on the origin of the story that happens in the novel of The Night Buffalo.
On the first question, Arriaga said that they were tricks of characterization; whereas of the story he said “many years ago I was very close to a person who was schizophrenic and this is the embryo of this story, to which I added the suicide of a friend.”
They burst under zero
Diego was most besieged of the night, although the people also enjoyed chatting with “the scriptwriter of Amores Perros” (Arriaga). Countless varieties of sushi appeared on the bar to feed the guests, whereas to drink was offered red wine, beer and soft drinks.
Armando Hernández and Jesús Ochoa, protagonists of the film Padre nuestro (Our Father), also presented at Sundance, chatted a long time, while Iliana Fox and Yazpik, not even separated for a second, drank to all the Mexicans present at the competition.
Erotic and powerful Before anything, The Night Buffalo is a sensual movie. It is a game of seduction and constant deception between the characters. Diego Luna offers perhaps his best dramatic interpretation up to the moment, and it is he who actually supports the whole feature film. Luna feels comfortable with Héctor Ortega’s camera to his back. Both know how the other will react and that helps the choreography that was assembled for every sequence.
The actor appears extremely thin, becoming emaciated, and he does not play the ingenuous child he claims to in other movies. Rather, he assumes the roll of a vulnerable young man prior to the events that come up after the suicide of his friend Gregorio, but ready to face everything necessary to preserve Tania's love (Liz Gallardo), the ex-girlfriend of Gregorio.
Manuel is in love with Tania, but he maintains intimate relationships with Gregorio's sister (Irene Azuela) and with his friend (Camila Sodi). This instinctive promiscuousness of Manuel, outside of all malice, is the pretext to show the subtle and passionate sexual meetings with the girls. And to show the naked body of all of them: Gallardo, Azuela and Sodi. The three girls are at a height of Luna in his work. They are not dwarfed and on the contrary, they seduce him each their own way.
The intention of Hernández with these scenes is not to provoke, opposite to what happens when Manuel wants to erase the tattoo of a buffalo with scissors, and blood escapes from his arm. The debut of the Venezuelan is a very well written thriller that is constructed by sequences fragmented in time (as all the works of Arriaga) and that at the end finds a logic that allows one to read the movie in a linear way.
If it is scratched a little, one finds resonances of Amores perros and in general of the work of Arriaga, as weapons, hunting, wild animals, fragmentation, some musical chords that sound very Santaolalla, up to the presence of Emilio Echevarría, who gave life to El chivo en Amores perros. The photography of Héctor Ortega is outstanding, always respecting the director.
The problem of The Buffalo is that the dramatic tension does not last 97 minutes, and there are a couple of occasions where the rhythm and indecision - or awkwardness - of his principal character makes the plot redundant. Perhaps he lacked a little personality or style in the film, but that something improves with time, and at rare times it’s possible to see in a debut.
Translated from: http://www.nuevoexcelsior.com.mx/27_1646.htm |
