This one’s an epic urban/crime drama set in East Los Angeles
that spans over ten years. The story
focuses on two half-brothers, Cruz (Jesse Borrego (Con Air)) and Paco (Benjamin Bratt (Demolition Man)) who are Mexican, and their cousin Miklo (Damian
Chapa (Ken from the Street Fighter
movie)) who is half Mexican and half white.
Their lives take vastly different turns and they ultimately find
themselves pitted against each other.
What’s really cool about this movie is the devotion to the
characters. We get to know their backstories
and we spend time exploring their personalities. Cruz is a gifted painter and he goes from
being the new hot artist to strung out on heroin. Paco starts out as a troublemaker (and ex-boxer)
and turns his life around to become a cop.
These two are relatively straight forward but our third main character
is more complex.
Miklo is the most interesting aspect of the film. It’s not him that necessarily struggles with
his identity it’s everyone else that does.
Miklo looks all white but talks, dresses and acts like his Mexican
cousins with a Spanish accent, a collared shirt buttoned only at the top, slicked
back hair and he fights the rival local gang.
He becomes a member of the Vatos Locos and is accepted as such among his
friends and cousins. But when he gets
sent to San Quentin for killing a dude that’s when his problems really
start. Miklo isn’t accepted right away
into the Mexican prison gang because he looks white so he needs to prove his
worth by taking out someone from the Aryan Brotherhood. After this he gets respect and climbs the
ladder to eventually become a high ranking member.
So in essence the roles are reversed with the all Mexican Paco
becoming a productive member of society and the half white Miklo turning into
the gangster. Cruz is caught in the
middle. The title of professional
painter makes me think of white guys like Van Gogh or Pollock but drugs makes
me think of all races so it balances. It’s
cool that this picture shows that skin color doesn’t mean shit and that
everyone is their own person.
Taylor Hackford directs and with this picture I think I finally
figured out how I feel about him.
Overall he seems to be a very bland director with no real discernible style. Of the five movies of his I’ve seen none are
shot particularly well or poorly. He
doesn’t do anything interesting production wise so the best I can say is he’s
competent. He shoots his shit straight
up with no frills. But the thing is he
tends to choose good scripts and/or good actors so his flat filmmaking isn’t as
noticeable. Take Ray for instance. I remember
telling people at the time that Jamie Foxx’s performance was better than the
film itself. With Blood In, Blood Out I think the script was so good that you could
bring in someone like Hackford to make the thing in a robotic manner and it
would still turn out fine (which it did).
It’s just a bit of a shame because this had masterpiece potential with a
better director at the helm.
As it is though, this is a pretty cool movie guys. A good chunk of it is spent in prison with
Miklo and the different races plotting against each other. Those portions and when Miklo and Paco meet
up again years later (this time as opposites and foes) are the best parts. Cruz’s story is the least interesting because
it’s the most standard but it’s pulled off well enough. Paco’s works better than it normally would
because usually a cop with a rough past isn’t explored in any detail. There’ll be a passing comment made by some character
to another character and that’ll be it. Here
we get a substantial backstory letting us know exactly where Paco’s coming from
so the hardnosed cop shit has something behind it.
By the time the credits rolled I was invested and ready for
more. It’s a bit episodic which gives this
more of a kickass TV show feel and also because they left things open ended
with Paco and Miklo. Check it out.
Curiosidades de la Película Sangre por Sangre (Blood In Blood Out) https://alexanderstrauffon.blogspot.com/2015/05/Curiosidades-de-la-pelicula-Sangre-por-Sangre-Blood-in-Blood-out.html
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