Pizza, birra, faso

If you are curious about Argentine cinema, start here.

There was before Pizza, birra, faso, and after. This is the masterpiece of the New Argentine Cinema. It was the first feature-length film in the genre. Among its innovations are the use of non-professional actors, continuous shots, location shoots, the use of language of the streets, and a deliberate attempt to make the film appear unstudied.

The film tells the story of a group of friends living a marginalized life on the streets of Buenos Aires as the city descended into poverty and crime in the 1990s. It is as good as the best of the Italian Neo-Realist movement of the 1940s and 1950s. It tells the story from the perspective of the friends, using their language of the street, without sentiment and without becoming manipulative. It's a story of good people trying to survive in a merciless society.

Pizza, Birra, Faso is a simple movie about a group of men who are broke and make their money by robbing people on the street. The two leaders of the group, Cordoba and Pablo, soon after the start of the film decide that they need to do bigger jobs with their crew in order to change their lifestyle. The movie as a whole gives off a dark vibe as it displays several situations of people being taken advantage of and suffering because of desperate people. Whilst Argentines can quite easily relate with the story and the events which take place, I believe a movie should try to take people away, at least for a short period of time, from that reality which is around them. The movie does however display a theme o hope to the audience through the actions of Cordoba as he looks out for his girlfriend and future baby. Not only this, but the character of Pablo also is a symbol of a caring and loving friend who will do all that is in his power to look out for his friend and his family.

I spent the beginning trying to guess which country in South America the movie was going on, as if I knew something about it, I found the approach interesting, but not very captivating, uncharismatic characters, unattractive script, everyday scenes, but that doesn't hold us back, as the good scene of the assault on the taxi, moreover, regular...

'Cordoba' a ruthless street thug makes a meagre living robbing middle class people in taxis but it's simply not enough as he has his gang and a pregnant girlfriend to look after - what marks Cordoba from the others is his gun which he isn't afraid to use and that everyone is game to be robbed, even the street musician with no legs with who they steal his days earnings without remorse.

Cordoba knows he has to get out for the sake of his girlfriend and baby but how? This is what the film is about and a very good film it is too. A low budget affair but the fact it was made on a shoestring doesn't take away from the fact the film is pure quality, well worth a watch indeed and better than many Hollywood productions that cost 50 times more.

This film illustrates a reality that almost all South American countries are living. The story is about four teenagers that have to steal to live, doing whatever they can to obtain some "pesos" . This film features lots of decadent scenes, that show the way of acting of these boys that can't get out of their sad reality even if they wanted so. Despite some technical problems in the film (due to low budget) this is one of the greatest Argentine titles released in the 90s. There's a curious thing, this film was almost not shown in cinemas due to a money problem that led to release complications. The international film festivals that Pizza, Birra, Faso won and the great numbers it did in the box office showed what an error that would have been. Really good. 8.5/10 .-