El sueño americano

A Better Life

Crit

Ladri di biciclette updated to southern California, a truck, and a undocumented Mexican single father as the victim of the vehicular jacking. The political and emotional decks are both stacked: Carlos (Demián Bichir) is exactly the sort of hardworking immigrant, dedicated to making a better life for his child, that built this country and should still be as welcome as Emma Lazarus could make him, while Luis (José Julián) would much prefer the fútbol pitch (pointedly, his favorite team is Chivas USA, not the Guadalajara parent club) to gang turf, but the environment provided by his school and his neighborhood are making the wrong decision seem inevitable.

Nonetheless, it works, partly because Bichir's prematurely lined face speaks so eloquently about where he has been, how far he has come, and what he would do to protect his own. Director Chris Weitz once exec produced a (not very good) film by his brother Paul called American Dreamz; good to see the family explore that theme with characters we care about, and without the trivializing spelling.