We Are What We Are (Jorge Michel Grau)

[pro-bassoonist]

Jorge Michel Grau's Somos lo que hay a.k.a We Are What We Are (2010) has received a preliminary release date: March 14. Screened in the Director's Fortnight section of this year's Cannes Film Festival.

Official site and trailer:
http://www.wearewhatweare.co.uk/

Al Kratina:

The recipe for any good film is a strong cast of characters seasoned with believable conflict. Spice it up with familial dysfunction, complex relationships, and social commentary, then feed it to Albert Fish, and you’ve got We Are What We Are, a brilliant horror film that’s composed of the good parts of American Beauty butchered and left to rot in the Mexican heat.

When his father dies, Alfredo (Francisco Barreiro) has to take control of his poverty-stricken family, who survive by repairing watches and eating the flesh of ritually slaughtered victims. His sister Sabina (Paulina Gaitan) supports him, but his brother, who exhibits all the self-control of a feral child halfway through a case of Red Bull, rebels. And his mother, a hard, controlling woman equal parts Wicked Witch of the West and Kate Gosselin, offers nothing but recriminations and complaints. Plus, Alfredo is also struggling with his sexuality, which distracts somewhat from his task of hunting for human sweetmeats.

Writer/director Jorge Michel Grau’s film is starkly realist, presenting a fantastic premise as entirely believable, to the point where I’ll bet a ‘Mexican cannibal scourge’ makes an appearance in Arizonan immigration legislation within the next two years. It’s a frightening film, all shadows, smeared grime, and blood, set to an unsettling score best described as a violin concerto killing itself. But by focusing on the family dynamics rather than traditional scares and shocks (without skimping on the gore, of course), Grau has created as powerful a drama as he has a horror film.

Pro-B