Though it’s not necessarily a perfect film, the teen drama,”Voy A Explotar” (“I’m Gonna Explode”) is very possibly our favorite picture of the New York Film Festival thus far and has probably already rocketed onto our top 10 list. Pulsating with vibrant and adolescent energy, the electrical current of its clip is mesmerizing and unforgettable. The Mexican cinema continues to be an emerging force that’s really coming into its own.
A not so subtle (but not obnoxiously overt) homage to the French New Wave, the works of Jean-Luc Godard and the love on the run stories ala “Bonnie & Clyde,” is magnetic (the George DeLerue musical appropriations and lovers bickering recall “Le Mepris,” the colors remind us of “Pierre le Fou,” and the vitality is pure, “Breathless”)
Executive produced by Gael Garcia-Bernal and Diego Luna, ‘Explode’ was chosen as part of the Toronto International Film Festival, the New York Film Festival and the Venice Film Festival. It vibrates with the dynamic spark of a first time filmmaker, but Mexican born director Gerardo Naranjo has actually made two feature films before this (this is honestly our introduction to his bold work, hello Netflix, stat)
Reckless and restless, misfit Román Valdez (newcomer Juan Pablo de Santiago) is the worst kind of privileged kid without zero responsibility and ample means at his disposal. The son of a corrupt politician, Román defiant and insouciant ways are constantly getting him in trouble and he gives his father nothing but relentless grief. Expelled numerous times from the finest private school institutions, the rebellious teen soon comes across the offbeat Maru (another newcomer making her debut, Maria Deschamps) and the star-crossed lovers soon make an instant connection after she’s the only one to applaud during his school talent show one man play (hilariously titled “See You in Hell”), where Román fakes his death by hanging. This controversial gag earns him another expulsion, but the incorrigible brandishes one of his father’s pistols, kidnaps Maru and take off on the road ala Arthur Penn’s famous film. They become partners in crime, lovers and the two halves of an inseparable circle that’s as doomed as any star-crossed tale.
Their collective parents desperately seek them out, but for political image reasons, the senior Valdez would rather not involve the police or the press (meanwhile the capricious duo are amusingly “on the run,” camped out on the roof of Román’s father’s mansion in a tent full of stolen booze and food.
Fractious, emo and naive just as all teens should be, “I’m Gonna Explode,” almost acts as a hopelessly idealistic manifesto to the electricity of youth and a politicized and impossible rebellion against the adult world.
Stylish, brazen and replete with clipped and gorgeous cinematography, like all adventurous cinema, the film tries to reinvent or at least breathe new life into film grammar with stunning and ambitious results. Even those that fail (and arguably there’s at least one or two), are to be admired (and we have to add some unbiased criticism the film does tend to slow down in the third act). Director Naranjo called the film, “an angst against stillness” and “a way to fight against the inertia that [the teens] feel from their surroundings [and] the nonsense and living in the comforts of an absurd society,” and if this was the aim, never has a more plangent and fiery battle been fought. A total winner and joy from pretty much minute one. [A+]
We couldn’t track all the music because it went by pretty quickly in the credits, but there’s some great, Spanish electro indie tunes in the film, plus tracks by composers Mahler, the aforementioned DeLerue and songs by Interpol (“Untitled” from Turn On The Bright Lights) and Bright Eyes (“Easy, Lucky Free” is a bit of a reoccurring theme).