PARIENTE/ GUILTY MEN (Kinsmen)
Colombia, 2016, 115 minutes, Colour.
Rene Diaz Calderon, Willington Gordillo, Leidy Herrera.
Directed by Ivan Gaona.
A film from Colombia, set in 2005. It is very much a film for Colombia itself – but had success in award nominations and in festivals.
The film presupposes knowledge of situations in Colombia in the latter part of the 20th century – although the focus is not specifically on the drug dealers and cartels but rather on paramilitary organisations and the relationship with the government. Audiences have to pay attention to the characters and the situations.
The film has an authentic feel, the locations where it was made, and the fact that the director used local people to act in his film. They are very convincing in dramatising roles that they experienced in actual life.
The opening is striking, a dark night, men waiting on the road for a meeting, an exchange, an old man shooting man involved in the exchange, money not handed over, the waiting men going back to their ordinary lives.
The old man who did the shooting has memories of the paramilitary. He also clashes with his prospective son-in-law who wants the money to finance his immediate wedding because his fiancee is pregnant. Another member of the group, the central focus of the film, is in love with the pregnant woman, serenades her, offers her cassettes from a cache of musical cassettes. He also observes the other two men, especially his rival, seeing his rival attack the father-in-law. Then there is another man, raising pigs, a drastic story of his father suspecting a man of stealing, shooting him (and taking his cache of assets), interacting with the others, but suspicious.
The key scenes are a gathering of the family to celebrate the announcement of the engagement, joy, revelry, but also rivalry.
There is also a scene with the testing out of a rifle, and the central character seeing his rival and the old man clashing and going to rescue the old man.
The other is a scene where the two rivals, at night, are pursued by a mysterious man on a cycle – indicating the paramilitary. And, it leads to a climax, the confrontation between the two men and the fiancee.
Certainly a film for those interested in cinema coming from Latin America.
