In Europe, unlike in America, actors are always working: 5 or 6 film shoots a year are not unusual. Even living legends like Catherine Deneuve shoot four a year........ It's their work culture, and ultimately, their lot. Even Deneuve and BARDEM are paid pittances (by US standards). These great actors' main objective is to stay out there, and not be forgotten. In brief, the movie business IS the TV business. This is a TV Film, and this is a TV appearance by the great Spanish actor Javier Bardem........Alas, life is not fair, and we have had to see him more than once in roles way beneath him. This is one more. Had he been born speaking flawless English, he'd be a great actor. His range is unbelievable, having played as many sides of the human psyches as come to mind now. His looks allow him to go from a monster to a drop dead gorgeous matinee idol. But he needs to get out there and work, even if it's as a thug, a gypsy, a Mexican. In short, he and the other actors (all thugs) in this film must do the most the can do. Hey, with his unbelievable talent and looks, he'll be lucky to play Don Quixote in twenty years (by the way, the last Don Q. was an Anglo. And Dulcinea was the beautiful African-American Vanessa Williams. Sancho Panza and the Duchess, in fact all the others, were of any nationality but Spanish). So even there the latest HALLMARK OF FAME production; yeah, fame of the Anglo-British world, they are discriminated against. What's left??? Well, play the Iberian thug, pimp, or scoundrel that the Northern "White" Community demands and expects. This is what this does. It especially casts Bardem, and all characters in this light: the unsavory (aren't they all?) Latin types.......... "White" Anglo-Saxons, Nordics and Scandinavians like to see it on TV, but not on their next penny-pinching vacation to the Spanish Coast........... Maybe (if anybody sees it), BEFORE NIGHT FALLS will catapult him to the heights he has long reached, served, but has gotten little or no credit for. He'd be wise to drop this film from his resume' if he ever gets where he deserves. This B version of a bad NYPD BLUES Episode can only entertain a die-hard fan of the genre, who will put up with, AND understand the equally "ruggedness" (to be nice) of the "macho" Madrid thug accent. Only the trite dialogue, with its total vocabulary of about 500 words, of which 50 are synonimous expletives, make it easier to understand.......But, are there potential viewers of this trash who will make this linguistic connection? I did. But I only succeeded on my third try, and as a personal dare. When they show it on TV in Belgium and Germany, it will of course be dubbed. So this is a moot point. They can understand, and have a laugh at the Southern Barbarians. The DVD now available only has English subtitles, no dubbing...Not yet!.....There had never been a Javier Bardem movie I couldn't sit through. He even makes delightful comedies a la Hugh Grant (MOUTH TO MOUTH, and others). But the "white" audience will only as a miracle accept him. They've already embraced the at least equally talented Antonio Banderas, and are in the process of accepting Penelope Cruz (though of course only as a "Latin woman : a Mexican cowgirl, a mulatta cook from Brazil, and other such dignified female roles, let's say the truth, as sensuous WHORES!)....... By the way, HEY WORLD! There are more than two types of Caucasians in the World. Yes, there is European humanity beyond the Anglo Saxons, and the LATINS (I include the French, Portuguese, Italian, etc. who are all pretty much equally stereotyped. Most people don't know the difference. Hell, throw the Greeks, Turks, and a dark Irishman in there too)........... Being German, is of course, unfortunately, still tricky and taboo. In fact, this mention will probably be censored. Verzeihung! They are also stigmatized. But hey, at least they still get to appear in polished boots, beautiful uniforms, great hair, and gorgeous vintage cars, full of the world's most beautiful women in the most wonderful 30s and 40s fashions. And of course, always commanding respect. The Latins are still dirty, unshaven, and in rags............Now being Eastern European opens up a world of roles as pimps, prostitutes, contract murderers, child traders, just... general low lives. But those are the people of the "East." Back to our Southern, scummy neighbors, there will be a time when this will change. But this movie won't do it. BELIEVE ME! This is not it. This is the same old pan-European movie showing the amusingly savage people of the "South." Javier BARDEM, here, is but the typical Spanish low-life that will sell to the anti-Latin (anti-Southern) right wingers of Europe, who will come in search of this seediness in their campers next summer. CANAL PLUS AND THE OTHERS will undoubtedly sell plenty of cheap beer and cigarettes (until that is forbidden by the EU) when they show this trash. This is not Spanish society; this is trash masquerading as Spanish life. Don't believe it. Don't see it. It's a waste of time, anyhow. From any point of view.
Review of Los lobos de Washington
Los lobos de Washington
(1999)
Javier, drop this 'dime a dozen' drama from your resume'
16 December 2000