Bittersweet symphony

A Mexican-American film of false identity and survival is now showing in India.

The suspenseful, gloomy mood of the Spanish-language film Padre Nuestro, also titled Sangre de Mi Sangre (Blood of my Blood) is aptly set off by wonderful acting. What strikes you most, through the events that take place in the grimiest streets of Brooklyn in New York, is the tangle of relationships, formed in the most bitter circumstances. “On its deepest level, Padre Nuestro is about the search for family,” says first-time director Christopher Zalla of his film, which won the 2007 Grand Jury Prize at Sundance and screened at Cannes.

Two young Mexican boys meet in a trailer-truck while emigrating illegally to New York. The earnest, innocent one, Pedro (Jorge Adrian Espindola) relates his story to the clever, street-smart Juan (Armando Hernandez). Pedro, we find out, has set out to look for his father, who left him 17 years ago for a better life in the US and who, according to his mother, is a wealthy restaurant owner in the city.

Pedro shares the letter he is carrying from mother to father with Juan, only to find the next day that he’s been robbed of all his belongings, including the letter. Cashless and directionless in New York, he stumbles along unknown streets in search of his father. On the way, he meets street prostitute Magda (Paola Mendoza), whom he persuades to help him.

Meanwhile Juan, having stolen Pedro’s identity and things, knocks on the door of Pedro’s father Diego (also called viejo or “old man”), pretending to be his son, only to discover that he’s no rich man. Less than happy to see his supposed son, Diego, in a fabulously underplayed performance by Jesús Ochoa, grunts and groans through Juan’s attempts to win him over.

Watch out for the scene in which Diego, who mocks his “son” for not being manly enough, develops new respect for him at a boys’ night out.

Between the two parallel stories, had the director not intended it so, one wouldn’t have noted the stark contrast between the boys. Juan knows just how to get his way, boasting wildly of his sexual exploits, while Pedro — quiet, apprehensive and helpless — turns away in disgust at even the mention of sexual perversion.

The screenplay, however, is slightly convoluted and the watcher’s patience is tested by a few unnecessary sub-events. But the central characters consistently tug at you and eventually you fall back on what transpires in the two main developing relationships.

It’s interesting to see how Diego’s bitter swearing turns to fond chiding towards the false Pedro and, in parallel, how the threatening Magda, who flinches at any touch unless she’s paid for it, gratefully allows Pedro (in a motherly moment) to gently bathe her after a near-rape incident.

Whether it is stolen identity or mutual survival, the boys bring a freshness to two other lives that have become too old and tired to be any good. The last few scenes are rushed, fleeting moments that capture what no one would have imagined, least of all the four protagonists.

Layered with various social issues — illegal immigration, lost identities, drugs, human trafficking and more — this is a film that will also make you chuckle. In a theatrical release by NDTV Lumiere, the film is showing at select PVR cinemas in Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore this week.