REVIEW: DVD Release: Sin Nombre

Film: Sin Nombre
Release date: 1st February 2010
Certificate: 15
Running time: 101 mins
Director: Cary Fukunaga
Starring: Edgar Flores, Paulina Gaitan, Jesus Lira, Emir Meza, Kristyan Ferrer
Genre: Drama/Thriller/Action
Studio: Revolver
Format: DVD
Country: Mexico

For countries like the UK, immigration is always high on the political agenda, with the public fearful of ‘undesirables’ making their way across the border, and setting up nearby residence and interfering with their comfortable, ignorant lifestyles – with little thought or care for who they are (hence the title, which translates to “Without A Name”) or what atrocities has brought them to their doorsteps. Using firsthand experience, writer/director Cary Fukunaga offers a scarily realistic insight into what may motivate a person to make such a precarious journey to a foreign country, where only public vitriol and struggle for acceptance awaits.

El Casper “Willy” (Edgar Flores) is a member of a fearsome gang, keen to recruit child El Smiley (whose initiation consists of a group beating from muscle-bound adults) into his way of life, and with the capability to murder a rival gang member without a second thought. However, he lives a second life, meeting up with his attractive girlfriend Martha, who dreams of something better for them both, unbeknown that Casper would never be allowed to break away from his ‘brothers’.

Aware of his fellow gang members’ capabilities, Casper keeps this relationship under wraps, but when one of his rendezvous’ impinges on his obligations to the gang, he is dealt a brutal punishment – but none crueler than the death of his partner, who perishes when trying to escape the evil clutches of would be rapist, gang leader Lil' Mago.

At the same time, Honduran teenager Sayra (Paulina Gaitan) has been reunited with her father, who is taking her across Mexico on the promise of a better life, and a new family in New Jersey.

When El Casper, new recruit El Smiley and the gang’s leader board the same train as Sayra, a now crestfallen Casper will take the opportunity to exact revenge on his lover’s killer – a decision that will save Sayra all manner of pain and suffering, but one that will make an already difficult and testing journey to the USA all the more dangerous…


Although filmmaker Cary delivers a decent cat-and-mouse thriller, as his once apprentice El Smiley sets out to deliver El Casper’s punishment and gain acceptance into the gang, what really stays with you after the credits have rolled is everything that surrounds the main story – the bigger picture.

In many ways, the thriller aspect is almost inconsequential – instead the picture provokes a number of questions about humanity - how can we allow fellow human beings to find themselves in such dire circumstances in the first place, and then how can we have the audacity to vilify them for joining gangs which offer them support and security unavailable elsewhere, or wanting to escape to another country where rape and pillage isn’t the norm?

Having spent years researching the film, including spending time with gang members (inside and outside of jail), immigrants (including youngsters who had lost limbs) and riding freight trains, Cary has been able to capture enough, if of course not all of what it must be like for these people – the desperation, uncertainty, fear and most of all sadness is palpable on every character’s face, including those who make up the enemy contingent here (who are unquestionably scary).

Without a big budget, there’s no real opportunity for flash or exaggeration, so we are left with an almost documentary-style attitude to filmmaking (augmented by the use of untrained actors with real experience of this way of life) – taking in the beautiful scenery, and bleak slums, that pass by; the uncomfortably realistic assaults; the huddled groups of anxious, poverty-stricken passengers who have to contend with the elements, undesirables, disgruntled passersby and border patrols; and the sheer humiliation – taken into custody and strip searched when you don’t have the right documentation.

Yet for all the despondency, the betrayal of a ‘friend’ to Casper as he tries to plot a safe journey to America, and all the heartbreak that the story does deliver before the end, you also gain an insight into the camaraderie and community support that see these people through – and the hope. Early on we see Casper hold a gun with El Smiley and shoot an already badly beaten rival gang member, yet by the end he is willing to sacrifice his own life to save that of a girl he’s only recently befriended. With more subtlety, we see children running by the side of the train and throwing up fruit (although, with a neat comic touch to lighten the mood later on, these turn to stones and cries of “f**king immigrants!”), people sharing what are obviously limited supplies, and communities welcoming and supportive.

The film doesn’t offer a solution, so you take in the events and are left to surmise for yourself, but it’s an eloquent rant that highlights why it’s so important foreign-language cinema gets a bigger platform and better exposure in countries such as the UK and America, where Hollywood dominates with nothing of consequence left to say, and any reaction from viewers attributed to the bizarre results of the lead’s latest facelift.

The film’s only failing is in that in opening up and revealing such a big, heartrending issue, the main story, although delivered at a good pace, doesn’t quite have the muscle to rack up the required tension in the lead up to a fairly predictable and unoriginal ending.


With such commendable motives, you can forgive Cary for any failings in the story’s execution, bringing to light a subject so often distorted by middle England’s stranglehold on the media and politics in this country, with all his care and passion resonating clearly on the screen. DH