Guadalajara Film Fest

The Scavengers - Faith Collapses Borders

Los Pajarracos--La Fe Derrumba Fronteras. (Mexico)

By ROBERT KOEHLER

A Gussi Artecinema release (in Mexico) of a Pajarracos Films production in association with La Fabrica Films/Fidecine/Revolution 435 D&C /Horacio Rangel-Ortiz/Jorge Alonso/Churubusco Azteca Studios. (International sales: Pajarracos Films, Mexico City.) Produced by Joe Solis, Hector Hernandez, Horacio Rivera. Directed by Hector Hernandez, Horacio Rivera. Screenplay, Rivera.
 
With: Miguel Rodarte, Itati Cantoral, Regina Orozco, Luis de Alba, Ivonne Montero, Cesar Bono.
 

Blue-collar farce that unashamedly plays to the peanut gallery, "The Scavengers" is as cocky, obnoxious and loud as its live-free-or-die hero (suitably dubbed "El Horny"), who dreams of making it to the Olympic Auditorium wresting ring in Los Angeles. Read as a populist spoof of the national Mexican desire to break down the border fence between U.S. and Mexico altogether, pic plays to anti-Yanqui sentiments while plowing the ultra-low brow end of broad comedy and could draw sympathetic Mexican auds on both sides of the border just at a time when illegal immigration issues are hot.

Horny protag Miguel (Miguel Rodarte) gets into trouble with major Sinaloa drug dealer Don Rosendo (Luis de Alba) when he boffs Don's daughter, and must make amends by working with crafty La Nana (Regina Orozco). She assigns Miguel to cross the border at Tijuana with a toy chicken doll, supposedly stuffed with drugs. This leads Miguel into a shrilly played and wildly overdone madcap course of nonsense that sends up everything from Tijuana's alleys filled with sex deviants to the town's Aztec-style performers.

Camera (color), Chuy Chavez; editor, Mayte Ponzanelli; music, Eugenio Toussaint; production designer, Barbara Enriquez; costume designer, Marcela Avila. Reviewed at Guadalajara Film Festival, March 28, 2006. Spanish, English dialogue. Running time: 91 MIN.