Soy Nero (2016) Reviews

• John Jim Wim and Sam ...

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  Soy Nero isn't an ordinary movie : definitely not commercial, it is rather a tale, like the one told in the introduction. A tale about the despair of Nero, a Mexican young man chased from California where he has grown, and he is trying to get back where his roots must continue to grow. In fact, it seems to be Rafi Pitts story, being half English and half Iranian, he grew in England and France. But his first movies were shot in Iran, they were maybe too politically incorrect and finally Rafi Pitts isn't allowed to return in Iran. Do you lose your soul when you lose your roots? Soy Nero seems to answer yes to the question . Nero desperately searches to establish himself in the American dream country of his youth, like his brother Jesus who lives in a gorgeous villa in Beverlly Hills. But Nero soon discovers his brother's truth and everything changes, forever. Paradoxically, his only way to get American identity is to enlist in US army and fight in Afghanistan, like all the famous green card soldiers. Soy Nero is the first movie to treat this subject, it isn't done on a demonstrative tone. Rafi Pitts seems rather fan of John Cassavetes, Wim Wenders or Jim Jarmusch, this kind of wandering cinema. When I heard the theme tune, it made me think of the Ry Cooder bottleneck guitar in Paris,Texas. The following sequences reminded me of John Cassavetes movies,especially with the American in the car and at his brother's place in Beverly Hills. And then second part in war, I thought of Sam Fuller's war movies like The Big Red One, same scenes of soldiers in ambush. Fuller could have said : Rafi? Sounds a good name for a character in a movie. And the last sequence repeats tragically another in the beginning. And the final theme tune is still guitar, but not acoustic, it is wildly fuzzy. Getting out of the theater still thinking of the movie, I walked back to the sub in Paris looking at three generations of migrants living on the sidewalks, asking myself so many questions ...

• Is that the reality of the American Dream?

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  I don't think that this movie can be the best advertisement to push "alien" citizens to enlist US Army troops in order to obtain the American citizenship. The story of a young Mexican, recently deported from LA to his homeland - Mexico -, who decides to come back to the USA, illegally of course, just to obtain the citizenship by enlisting the US Army and serve in Afghanistan. So, in the first time he decides to find his brother who lives in LA, more precisely in Beverly Hills, him, a Chicano...Believe it or not, a simple poor born Chicano living in a superb millions worth villa in Beverly Hills. But it appears that our lead's bro is simply a simple man of all work, the mechanic henchman of a Mexican billionaire, supposed to be a major "musician" drug baron. It is never specified, just "suggested". That's when the feature stops to be a social film to become a war feature. The young Mexican enlists the Army with a phony ID that his bro has given him and finds himself a couple of months later in the middle of the Afghan desert... I won't tell you more, but you can guess that movie is not very comfortable to watch. It is a brutal, violent criticism of the American politics towards foreigners asking to fight for the USA in order to obtain the Green Card. Maybe Ken Loach would have made a better film, more deeply described, more accurate, maybe, but this film remains powerful and depressing too. A real must see.