Gun Hill Road

The title has so little to do with what actually happens in this film and is so suggestive of some kind of rural drama that I just have to say: "WHAT were they thinking?". (I'm a native New Yorker, by the way, and even I didn't know this was a key neighborhood in the Bronx.) Otherwise, this is a powerful, sure-footed film which very often leaves things not quite spoken, down to the precise, powerful ending. It is, in its way, a pendant to "Pariah", though more specifically about transgender issues. Above all, what makes it work is the tremendous love one feels between all the characters here, well beyond any stereotypes. Harmony Santana has arrived. plain and simple, and arrived with a multi- colored splash. Esai Morales (who gets credit right off as one executive producer) does a marvelous job of showing a father who loves his son with all his heart but has a constellation of reasons for not being able to accept the changes he was not there to see. Judy Reyes shows passionate ambivalence as her character tries to balance love for several different people in inherently conflictual relationships. Everybody, including his prison nemesis (Robert Salzman) and his parole officer ((Isiah Whitlock, Jr.), is perfectly cast (by Sig de Miguel and Stephen Vincent). Its subject and its subtlety make this an indie film in spirit, but it retains all the best techniques of strong, straight-ahead story-telling.