The Couchpotatoes After reading so much positive reviews about Miss Bala I thought I was going to be in for a treat but it turned out to be a great disappointment. It's just a weak movie with not much positive to say about. I thought it was extremely slow with a lot of moments where the story was going nowhere. About the main character played by Stephanie Sigman, if it was to make her look depressed for the whole movie then she did a good job. Don't expect a lot of great conversations because it's the opposite you will get. I'm sure the situation in Mexico regarding the corruption and the drug cartels is really bad but it's not like in Miss Bala. It's just not a good reflection of the situation there. Despise all the good reviews, to me this movie is boring. I even had to watch it in two times because I fell asleep the first time.

SnoopyStyle Good girl Laura Guerro and her friend Suzu enter and qualify for the Miss Baja pageant. Laura is waiting for Suzu at a nightclub when a drug gang breaks in to kill the drug enforcement cops. She escapes from the massacre and tries to find Suzu. She seeks help from a cop but he calls in a gang who kidnaps her. The gangleader takes an interest in her and makes her compete in the pageant. He kidnaps her father and little brother pulling her further into the crime family.This is a wild crazy crime drama. This movie is nuts. One really feels for Laura. I wish she has a drug gang watchdog on her for the whole movie. She needs another person to build a relationship, have conversations and to interact with. Her character needs to show more struggle. Of course, the gang has her in complete control. The only way for her to show some spark is through some dialog with another person. That's the main thing missing here.

Leofwine_draca Why are Mexican films so depressing? That's the question I find myself asking, having watched three recent slices of Mexican cinema: WE ARE WHAT WE ARE, HELI, and now MISS BALA. Okay, so this isn't quite as write-slittingly miserable as REQUIEM FOR A DREAM, but it also lacks the style and gripping storytelling that made the Aronofsky film so compelling.In MISS BALA, the subject is once again Mexican drug gangs, and like HELI we follow the path of an innocent family drawn into an ugly world against their will. The protagonist in this movie is Laura, an attractive young woman who plans on entering a local beauty contest, only to find herself in the grip of some truly unpleasant characters thanks to some poor choices on her part.What follows will surprise nobody with knowledge of the crime and violence prevalent in modern-day Mexico. It's a grim, ugly movie, filled with stark bursts of violence and an unending level of misery directed at the lead. The performances are so naturalistic that they don't even exist; Stephanie Sigman seems to be sleepwalking through her role and as a result it's hard to feel much empathy for her character. Indeed, the whole film is just so nasty that you'll want to take a cold shower afterwards, even though none of it is particularly explicit. Hardly enjoyable viewing, but those interested in the subject matter might get something out of it. Me, I like stories with more suspense, more identifiable characters, people you can get to like and care about, stories that offer a measure of hope instead of unrelenting depression.

zetes A terrifying descent into Hell. Stephanie Sigman stars as a 23 year-old woman who enters the Miss Baja California beauty pageant in her hometown of Tijuana. Apparently, the pageant is partially run by drug lords (the story is at least in part based on real-life events), and Sigman finds herself quickly sucked into a war between criminals and drug enforcement, and the latter is no more moral than the former. This film is deliberately paced, but gripping as Hell and insanely scary, scarier than any horror movie I saw this year. Sigman is excellent in the lead. Sometimes it's hard to follow, but I think that's on purpose, as the whole film is told from the point of view of Sigman, who probably isn't all that clear on what's happening to her much of the time. Director Naranjo certainly posits himself as a director to watch (I'll have to go back to see some of his previous films).