Los Olvidados

A characteristically unsentimental look at the life of some juvenile delinquents very much on the periphery of civilised society in the moral and physical squalor of the slums of Mexico city. The two pivotal characters of the film are Pedro and Jaibo. In Pedro, Bunuel charts the gradual corruption of the young in a brutalising environment. Jaibo, the older of the two, has escaped from some detention center and avails himself of his size and complete lack of scruples to tyrannise his associates. As characters maunder around the slums, they constantly bump into Jaibo, finding it impossible to escape his pernicious influence because of his seeming ubiquity. Early on in the film Bunuel establishes one of his auteur motifs, that of the closeness of humans to the other animals. This, along with his usual fascination with dreams and elucidating the psychosexual stirrings of his male characters through point-of-view shots of the fragmented female body, bear testament to the fact that despite the thin facade of Italian Neorealism, this film has the same Bunuelian fascinations as usual. He did love De Sica's 'Shoeshine' but gives the sentimental approach a wide birth, documenting with almost entomological objectivity the lives of those consigned to oblivion in a rigidly stratified society. Perhaps the most prominent theme of the film is the omnipresence of violence and its corollaries. It is adumbrated that in order to adapt, the characters must use violence and suspicion, anything else being self-defeating. On the other hand, it can be seen as merely a foundation on which Bunuel builds his career long fascination with the id, in this case in an environment where inhibiting forces don't exist. Bunuel was not some recent Hollywood director using violence to pander to the pathological scopophilic tendencies of modern audiences who need its lurid details to jolt them out of their torpor. He conceptualises it. Much remarked upon is the swift tempo of the film created through the lack shots lingering on the action to supplement sentimental and dramatic effect. In a world where violence is ever present Bunuel shoots and edits the film in such a way as to comment on the generally held attitudes toward violence in this society. If it was a Hollywood production, there would be the usual platitudes, such as corny slow-motion effects and bathetic music. The dream sequence in the film is perhaps his finest, although I'm not going to bother attempting some abstruse psychoanalytical interpretation as it's beyond me. The picture quality, although not properly restored, is more than adequate, far better than the Yume releases of Mexican Bunuel films. One thing that puzzles me though, is the running time. Wherever I read about the film it is always stated that it about 90 minutes, but this version clocked in at an hour and sixteen? I hope it hasn't been mutilated by some upstart philistine, because to me it is unpardonable, tantamount to trying to appropriate a director's work for yourself. A film should be shown how a director intended, anything else is usurpation. I hope it isn't the case.

A vivid display of life amongst the poor of Mexico City where crime affects your life whether you want to avoid it or not.

A strong drama well worth watching.