Minervini’s work about the real America i.e. the disturbia of the working-class provokes with its sheer no-bullshit honesty, with an invisible camera that gives zero distinction between drama and documentary.
Review #2,882
Dir. Roberto Minervini
2015 | USA, Italy | Drama, Documentary | 92 min | 1.85:1 | English
Not rated – exceeds R21 guidelines for unsimulated sex and coarse language
Cast: Mark Kelley, Lisa Allen, James Lee Miller
Plot: Disarmed veterans, taciturn adolescents or drug addicts live in an invisible territory at the margins of society, at the border between anarchy and illegality, trying to respond to the threat of being forgotten by political institutions and having their rights as citizens trampled.
Awards: Nom. for Un Certain Regard Award & Golden Eye (Cannes)
International Sales: Doc & Film International
Accessibility Index
Subject Matter: Slightly Mature – Marginalised Communities; Anti-Establishment; Hate Politics
Narrative Style: Straightforward
Pace: Slightly Slow
Audience Type: General Arthouse
Viewed: Le Cinema Club
Spoilers: No
Wow. This film took me aback with its sheer no-bullshit honesty about the Americans left behind during the Obama Administration.
Under the radar, marginalised and some in abject desperation, they try to survive by doing odd labour-intensive jobs or selling their bodies. In one scene in a sleazy nightclub, a pregnant woman shoots meth up her veins before pole dancing in the nude.
In another, a paramilitary group, operating on the pretext of the 2nd Amendment which confers rights to people to bear arms to protect the security of a free State, hopes to recruit more people. This is ‘the other side’, the real America, the disturbia of the working-class.
“I wish Obama would actually do something about the rest of the world too, other than just the White House and himself. There’s a whole United States.”
Roberto Minervini, an Italian director who has built a reputation engaging with the sociopolitical conditions of the US of A, gives us a film of startling frankness, filled with racial slurs, unsimulated sex and drug use, yet because of the way he has shot it—with zero distinction between drama and documentary—we have no choice but to empathise with these real people who are themselves.
It is quite amazing—or perhaps ‘bewildering’ is a better word—to see how the camera probes into these private spaces of conversations and actions, yet it feels invisible. It feels like Minervini isn’t there too, much like what Kiarostami alluded to as the ‘non-director’ when he made Ten (2002).
At the same time, The Other Side isn’t a raw, gritty film; it has rather polished and well-thought-out visuals. Hence, you may leave the film sufficiently provoked, not just from its content but also its very form and construct. I would describe this type of filmmaking as similar to Kelly Reichardt’s style but a tad more real than real.
Grade: A-
Trailer:
Eternality Tan 