The sensation of the fabric of the everyday world being ripped apart to afford a glimpse of something shocking lying beneath it is not an easy thing to pull off in film. And yet in this debut feature by Stillz, set in Medellín, Colombia, in 1987, the mysterious director of Bad Bunny’s music videos manages to create a disturbing sense of unease, sadness and solitude, guiding the viewer on a joyride of genres in a found footage-film that pays tribute to the lost boys of the hillside comunas. It blends the intensity of The Blair Witch Project with the punk spirit of Repo Man while crafting a haunting requiem that possesses a similar mesmerising quality to Gaspar Noé’s Enter the Void.
The film hits the ground running in Colpisos, with a group of lads violently nicking a camera from a news reporter who is speaking about mysterious goings-on in the local area. From there, we follow their trail of destruction as they steal a Mercedes-Benz and embark on an armed robbery of a jewellery shop. The heist goes wrong and they end up in hiding. From there the viewer is guided through the hillside dwellings and a day in the life of its inhabitants – including direct-to-camera testimony from the boys – before taking a swerve into dreamlike strangeness. What begins as a curious tour through the area, where the mood can shift at any moment, descends into a nightmarish encounter.
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The comunas are a hotbed of rebellious cultural and physical pursuits: punk bands practise on rooftops, young kids use discarded bollards as weights and old women whittle wooden tools with swords. A mum expresses her anxieties about her wayward son while one of the lads uses the stolen camera to observe and engage with despairing figures teetering over the edge of buildings. The views of the glowing lights from the metropolis below call to them through camerawork and cinematography reminiscent of Chinese filmmaker Bi Gan’s enthralling work. Amid all the anger a huge amount of melancholy is emitted by each of the boys: “We wanted to believe in something but we got our asses kicked,” one of them explains.
The film merges gloomy, alarming and furious words with harsh sounds, white noise, laughter and elegiac hymns. The daring sound design and score by experimental Venezuelan musician Arca heightens the violent chaos and enhances the disquiet as a disembodied camera glides its way through the flickering lights and shadows of crumbling roads and graffitied labyrinths. Philip Glass and John Carpenter’s musical work seems like an influence as the film reaches its horror-laced finale.
The boys at the centre of Stillz’s captivating debut desperately rage against the dying of the light as they seek peace and stability. They are already mourning their lives at such a young age, and the film translates their pain and grief with an otherworldly and off-kilter menace. In a place where hope is extinguished, Barrio Triste offers a meaningful space for their spirits to rest and be remembered.
