HERE COMES THE DEVIL (2012) movie review

Here Comes the Devil (2012) d. Adrián García Bogliano (Mexico/US)

A young Mexican couple (Francisco Barreiro, Laura Caro) takes a weekend jaunt to Tijuana with their two adolescent children (Alan Martinez, Michele Garcia). In a scene that recalls Peter Weir’s fascinating and haunting Picnic at Hanging Rock, the bored youngsters venture up a rocky hill, disappearing into a dark cave. As dusk falls and their offspring fail to return, the panicked parents call the police, haunted by guilt as they spend a sleepless, blame-filled night in a seedy hotel nearby. The next morning, the cops arrive with the kids in tow, but something is off – they seem distant, traumatized. Over the week that follows, the family is slowly torn asunder by dark forces from both within and without.

WE ARE WHAT WE ARE (2010) movie review

We Are What We Are (2010) d. Grau, Jorge Michel (Mexico)

Intriguing ideas-a-go-go but with more questions raised than answers in this kitchen sink drama surrounding an urban family of cannibals whose lives are thrown into turmoil when their patriarch keels over in the opening scenes, leaving them without a bread-winner (or fresh meat-procurer). All of the characters are interesting unto themselves and the relationships provide chewy material, but it’s both too much and too little for the central story.