r-albury This movie seemed slow and unimpressive at the beginning. As the movie progressed, however, its true depth was evident. It is a true representation of the life of an immigrant in a foreign community filled with prejudice, but it is not the stereotypical coming to America story. Freddy, an illegal immigrant in Argentina, struggling to support his family back in Bolivia slowly, and almost silently, wins the hearts of the audience and the story shines through despite the strange camera angles and the footage being in black and white. The majority of the film takes place around the bar in the small corner café and the prejudice is evident in almost every interaction, be it in the soccer game on TV or in the face to face encounters that happen across the bar. In the final scene, after Freddy's death, the bar owner simply replaces his 'help wanted' sign, showing that to him Freddy was nothing more than a means to an end and is easily replaced.

supergrandefilms-1 Just watched this film and it is not an objective representation of life in Buenos Aires. It is clearly subjective and 100% racist. Check out the opening soccer sequence with its skewed perspective and you get the picture.In general terms, it's all low grade B&W mud just like this poor excuse of a film. From the beginning till the end... the script and filmmaker's POV perpetuates separation between countries and cultures.Ultimately, what makes this story thematically xenophobic is that the Bolivian protagonist is murdered with no accountability, thus the filmmaker's message is... that's it's okay to be a racist.How would the Director like it if we made a movie about crack whores from Montevideo working in Buenos Aires and called it... URUGUAY?

ronaldreinds i've seen this movie about 6 times now. and with me a growing number of people in honduras. this country lives on the American dream, so this is a eye opener for them. it shows the real live illegals have. the rough and tough conditions in which they live and work, the in hospitality of the people around them. the introduction of the movie is simply superb and already lays an underground for the rest of the film. shot on 16 mm black and white, the movie has an immense draw to it. and it doesn't matter that the acting is rough on the edges, it just ads. it has made some honduras think things over, but they probably still will go. fits in with La Ciudad and El Norte.

boudu Xenophobia in the third world. Can you believe that. Caetano is possibly the most interesting Argentine director of the 2000s. There is no heros here. Only good characters in a interesting urban collage. Short and entertaining. 8/10