A cielo abierto

As "Upon Open Sky" (2023 release from Mexico; 117 min) opens, it is "Coahuila Desert, 1993" and a father and his teenage son's car is hit by an 18 wheeler, causing the father's death. We then go to "Mexico City, Two Years Later", where we pick up with the teenage son, now 14, his older brother, and their new stepsister. At this point we are 10 into the movie...

Couple of comments: this movie is an Arriaga film affair: the script is by Academy Award winning Guillermo Arriaga ("Babel"), and co-directed by his children Mariana and Santiago Arriaga. Here they assess the impact of a father's death upon his children, while also finding their way in a newly mixed family (with a stepfather and stepsister). On its face, a chunk of the movie is a true road movie, where Fernando, Salvador and their stepsister are driving towards the Mexico-US border in search of the truck driver who caused their father's death (which covers the first half of the movie). But of course the big question is: what will they do if indeed they find the truck driver (which covers the second half of the movie). The movie is quite introspective, as we slowly learn how each of Fernando and Salvador have coped/still are coping with their father's death, while getting to know their stepsister. This is NOT an action movie, or a coming-of-age movie. It is a deeply moving family drama which deeply resonated with me.

"Upon Open Sky" premiered at the 2023 Venice Film Festival, and Netflix eventually acquired it. I happen to read a positive review of it in this Friday's New York Times, and immediately added it to my list of movies to watch. If you are in the mood for a slow-movie, introspective family drama in Mexico, I'd readily suggest you check this out, and draw your own conclusion.

We all loved 21 Grams (2003), Babel (2006), and Amores Perros (2000) because, beyond being well-crafted productions, they boasted screenplays that told extraordinary stories.

And this film is written by Guillermo Arriaga, the screenwriter of those three masterpieces. What's more, the film is directed by his own children, Mariana Arriaga and Santiago Arriaga.

And yet, the film is a cinematic tragedy, a waste of its potential. Guillermo Arriaga has previously delivered films that hit you like a punch to the gut, leaving you with a lump in your throat. He aimed for something similar here, but the directorial choices are so dreadful that the film, instead of leaving you speechless, repels you.

Oddly enough, I discovered this film through Spotify, as the score is by Ludovico Einaudi, and the soundtrack album was released after the film's screening at the Venice Film Festival. The general release was delayed for various reasons. As a fan of Spanish cinema, my excitement reached a fever pitch when I learned who the screenwriter was. But haven't 2023 and 2024 already been years of dashed expectations for cinephiles who placed their faith in beloved names?

For me, this film falls squarely into that category.

The same clichés as his father Guillermo Arriaga but very bland and with pretensions of auteur cinema. It is difficult not to notice that the shadow of Guillermo Arriaga's films is present in every minute of the film:

• the rustic north as a setting (Babel and the Three Burials of Melquíades Estrada, the novel Salvar el fuego),
• the protagonist with an imperious need to go "to the north" (the novel El Salvaje),
• characters with no apparent psychological evolution (Babel),
• the snooping of a minor always towards his sister (Babel),
• the theme of hunting (Babel),
• amoral sexual relations (like Octavio's love affair with Susana in Amores Perros),
• the moral superiority of the bourgeoisie (like in El Salvaje, Salvar el Fuego, 21 grams, or Las extrañas),
• a nondescript working-class character who commits an unintentional murder and cries for mercy on his knees from the bourgeoisie (like Jack Jordan in 21 grams),
• forgiveness as the culmination of the
• the expressionless protagonist, crude in his interpersonal dealings, solitary - and who makes one think of a certain autism - but who is morally superior to the average character (like Manuel in El Búfalo de la Noche, Juan Guillermo in El Salvaje, José Cuauhtémoc in Salvar el Fuego)
• and of course the theme of revenge (Amores Perros, Babel, 21 grams, El Salvaje, Salvar el fuego).

All these themes are mixed here in a blender without lactose, without caffeine, without any emotion. There is no real contribution to cinematography in any sense, only "bread with the same". The only thing that stands out is the need to show the public that Arriaga's children are going to continue with the same themes as their father and that there will be no evolution.