Misfortunes of Imaginary Beings: 11/12/23

A blog formerly known as Bookishness / By Charles Matthews

"Dazzled by so many and such marvelous inventions, the people of Macondo ... became indignant over the living images that the prosperous merchant Bruno Crespi projected in the theater with the lion-head ticket windows, for a character who had died and was buried in one film and for whose misfortune tears had been shed would reappear alive and transformed into an Arab in the next one. The audience, who had paid two cents apiece to share the difficulties of the actors, would not tolerate that outlandish fraud and they broke up the seats. The mayor, at the urging of Bruno Crespi, explained in a proclamation that the cinema was a machine of illusions that did not merit the emotional outbursts of the audience. With that discouraging explanation many ... decided not to return to the movies, considering that they already had too many troubles of their own to weep over the acted-out misfortunes of imaginary beings."
--Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude

Sunday, November 12, 2023

Nine Queens (Fabián Bielinsky, 2000)

Ricardo Darín and Gastón Pauls in Nine Queens

Cast: Ricardo Darín, Gastón Pauls, Leticia Brédice, Ignasi Abadal, Tomás Fonzi, Oscar Núñez, Celia Juárez, Elsa Berenguer, Leo Dyzen. Screenplay: Fabián Bielinsky. Cinematography: Marcelo Camorino. Production design: Daniela Passalaqua. Film editing: Sergio Zottola. Music: César Lerner.

Marcos (Ricardo Darín), a seasoned con artist, spots Juan (Gastón Pauls) making what looks like a rookie mistake trying to con a cashier making change for him in a convenience store. So, being in need of a partner, he takes Juan under his wing for a day. Both men are down on their luck and in need of substantial sums of money, so when Juan proves to be adept, the two launch on a major scam: selling a sheet of forged collectible postage stamps known as the Nine Queens to a wealthy mark. That's the setup for an entertaining genre piece with attractive performances and more than a few surprise twists. Writer-director Fabián Bielinsky guides his cast through some lively scenes, many of which were shot on the streets of Buenos Aires. Lacking the budget for a full complement of extras, Bielinsky surrounded his stars with a small cadre of hired actors to act as a buffer against lookie-loos; the result has energy and veracity. (Moviemaking is often a con game itself.) Naturally, the movie hinges on who's conning whom: the sharpie Marcos, the less-experienced Juan, or their mark, the wealthy stamp collector (Ignasi Abadal), who just happens to be staying in a hotel where Marcos's sister, Valeria (Leticia Brédice) works? (There's some family tension around an inheritance that Marcos cheated Valeria out of.) The ending is a jaw-dropper that works as long as you don't ask the questions that you aren't supposed to ask. Nine Queens was remade in the United States as Criminal (Gregory Jacobs, 2004), with John C. Reilly and Diego Luna in the roles played by Darín and Pauls.