Sin Nombre (2009)

Remember the window scenery in Back to the Future 2 (1989)? How Michael J Fox could change the vista with the click of a switch? In contemporary Sin Nombre, a painting of golden leafed woods is presented to the viewer as scenery. Cut To: Casper sitting in his kitchen staring at the picture. His bare back is painted with the ink of Mara Salvatrucha. There are no switches to click.

Anywhere but here.

Sin Nombre is a work of fiction. Mara Salvatrucha is the work of nightmares. Also known as MS-13, they are a street gang the way the United States is a military power. They are murderers. They are to be feared. Theirs is a deadly presence in the US, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, El Salvador and recently Canada. What motivates young men to such organisations? It’s the same aspiration that sees grown men join secret societies: the Freemasons, the Illuminati, the Skull and Bones (members include President George H W Bush and President George W Bush).

In our world, most men (and women) form a herd. There are those men who form a pack. Each year over a million wildebeest migrate across the Serengeti chasing the rains. Each year the lions and crocodiles and hyenas gorge. Disadvantaged, disenchanted, discriminated young men form gangs – packs that wreck havoc on the world that has abandoned them. It is a watermark of a failed society where families desert their young.

Set in Mexico, Sin Nombre shows teenage Casper introducing a willing Smiley (10 years old maybe) to his clique. As much as Smiley’s grandmother tries to stop this, she cannot. A grandmother cannot do the work of two parents. The clique is run by Lil’ Mago: a sadist, a rapist, a maniac. The homies look like a wild bunch of juvenile Mayan warriors. They jump Smiley in.

Sayra (13 years old or so) lives in Honduras with her grandmother. Her father arrives to take her north. North America. New Jersey. He’s been gone so long she can hardly remember him. He’s only there because he got deported.

Casper is in love with Martha Marlen. She reminds me of African women: demanding, loving, loyal. By falling in love with a gang member, she attracts the attention of the devil.

Anyone can take a beating – some people have to. In order to earn respect within the gang a homie has to put in work. Smiley has to commit murder. The homies feed the chivala to the dogs.

British television recently showed the path of the illegal immigrant from West Africa; through the Sahara across the Mediterranean through continental Europe over the English Channel and into the land of hate and racism. It’s a short trip compared to the illegals from China. Why would anyone want to come here?

No one risks death by choice.

Sayra and her father and uncle trek through the Honduran jungle for over six hours into Guatemala. They cross country into Mexico where they are promptly robbed by border guards. Then they’re stripped.

Sayra is a teenage girl surrounded by men.

They survive this ordeal and arrive at a terminal, waiting for the train that will take them to the US border. Meanwhile, for a gang member putting in work means going on the rob. Lil’ Mago takes Casper and Smiley on expedition. What makes a soft target? An illegal immigrant. The homies board the train for easy pickings then the rapist Lil’ Mago sees Sayra.

First time director Cary Joji Fukunaga presents his debut feature in rich detailed widescreen. In a story of immigration and flight he backgrounds rail tracks, bridges and water. In the foreground are the trains – snaking from the bottom of the screen to the top – with human beings sitting atop the carriages. People leave their homelands and loved ones and risk death – because there is no hope left.

What could have been a simple tale is made complex by its characters. Casper has seen love. He has an alternative to gang life. Smiley is a desperate inductee. He basks in the adulation of MS-13 among his civilian peers. He tastes the camaraderie amongst the border town clique. He wants his tattoos. Sayra is an abandoned child being pulled from Honduras to America by a father who doesn’t really care about her. She needs love, too. She seeks it on the illegal immigrant path into Texas.

Sin Nombre is a gang related film more in the tradition of Boyz n the Hood (1991) than La Haine (1995). The writing is as lyrical as a novel, and the young actors give astounding performances. As beautiful as this film is, its tragedy makes for painful though compelling viewing. This is a film of journey and destination: Casper’s journey out of the gang, Smiley’s journey into it, Sayra’s journey to America.

Be careful what you wish for.

(Reproduced by kind permission of Thrill Fiction)