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Title: Secuestro express (2005)
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| Credited cast: | |||
| Mía Maestro | ... | Carla | |
| Rubén Blades | ... | Carla's Father | |
| Carlos Julio Molina | ... | Trece | |
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Pedro Perez | ... | Budu |
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Carlos Madera | ... | Niga Sibilino |
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Jean Paul Leroux | ... | Martin |
| Rest of cast listed alphabetically: | |||
|
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Dalila Colombo | ||
| Elba Escobar | ... | Drugstore Cashier | |
|
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Dimas González | ... | Guardia |
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Miguel Ángel Landa | ... | Police's Councilor. |
|
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Balmore Moreno | ... | Oficial Briceno |
| Ermahn Ospina | ... | Marcelo | |
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Rider | ... | Cangrejo |
In a night pregnant with a strange mix of tension and dizzy abandon, lovers Carla and Martin prowl clubs before drunkenly wandering back to his car. While he comes across as crass nouveau riche, she appears more liberal. Their conspicuous affluence, however, makes them ideal targets for kidnappers, and the trio of Trece, Budu and Niga gets a bead on them and promptly sweeps them up at gunpoint. The kidnappers then demand $20,000 to be delivered in two hours. Carla phones her rich father Sergio to procure the money, but chaos soon ensues. A botched ATM robbery is followed by a stopover at the palatial estate of a gay drug dealer. Written by Sujit R. Varma
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"Secuestro Express" began as a project for a short. Jonathan Jakubowickz had written a story and Sandra Condito and Elizabeth Avellán, among others, wanted to make it happen. For reasons that don't matter to me, the short became a full-length feature film, the hours became longer, the work became harder
The result makes notorious that it was supposed to be a short, because it runs obligatorily too long. However, it's a total thrill and it keeps your eyes on the screen for its hour and a half. After Jakubowickz made his story longer, the characters took shape, and what could have been a tale of soulless kidnappers, is a glance at human beings who care for their city, even when they do what they do.
Jakubowickz' ferocious camera is a representation of the Venezuelan reality; it moves unsure, it accelerates constantly. With guts and courage, the director puts his imagination in motion, and shows to us the two sides of the city; the rich and the poor, the good and the bad, the ones who eat and the ones who can't, the ones who live and the ones who are dying. The Latin American reality is not far from what Jakubowickz presents. In fact, there are thousands of kidnappings like the ones this movie illustrates, every day.
"Express"; quick, effective and only sometimes successful. The types of persons, who do this; act, dress and talk like the film's kidnapping threesome: Nigga Sibilino, Budú and their leader Trece. Interestingly, this is how these three men call themselves artistically. They are part of a hip-hop band called "3 Dueños". Jakubowickz got to them by listening to their music, and the characters he wrote for them fit perfectly with their personalities; he knows it and they know it.
One of the many highlights of this picture is that all the characters are very close to the actors' realities. The three kidnappers come originally from the suburbs, and they didn't have to make an effort for their portrayals; they had it in them. A permanent improvisation is clearly noticeable and it reassures the "reality" of the film. When the three of them grab Martín (Jean Paul Leroux) and Carla (Mía Maestro) and scream: "Don't look at my face", they say it because it works like that.
They are not joking with the guns they carry with them, they are not joking when they call Carla's father (the genius Ruben Blades), and they are not joking with the drugs they purchase from Marcelo (Ermahn Ospina), a Colombian and homosexual dealer. The scenes that the movie develops are determined by a voice that announces the time ("5 a.m., in Caracas"). The best moments are the ones you feel connected to, because you identify with them. When they are stopped by the police, for example; and a simple exchange fixes the situation.
When Trece talks to Carla about the city and about what's going on. "What's the secret?", she inquires. Trece explains, and you easily realize that Carlos Molina put the most commitment into his character. He achieves something there, there's an emotion felt that Pedro Pérez and Carlos Madera lack. If what the film's doing is leaving a message, I respect it. But that message won't make anyone change, because it takes a lot more in a world like this one.
What I can say for sure are two things: "Secuestro Express" is a calling to Venezuelan cinema, these days when it's so difficult to make a complete movie; and it is so real and so true, that you will be scared to be out on the street after watching it.