Dir/scr: Adrian Biniez. Uruguay-Germany-Argentina-Netherlands. 2009. 84mins.
The only gigantic thing in this otherwise modestly minimalist first movie is the large supermarket in which it is set. Adrian Biniez's main character, a solitary 35-year-old security guard who is secretly infatuated with a cleaning woman working the night shift, is another worthy addition to the gallery of lonely men so much in favour with new Latin American cinema. While it generates some curiosity for the first half hour, Gigante loses its grip as its non-plot plods slowly towards an ending that might be the beginning of a sequel. Film festivals could be interested, but elsewhere it should be restricted to art houses with a Latin American bent.
Jara (Camandule), a heavy-set surveillance office working the graveyard shift, leads a dull and routine existence: he watches CCTV monitors all night long, goes home to sleep on a sofa while the television drones on in the background, solves crossword puzzles, listens to heavy metal on his iPod and spends some time with his nephew. At the weekends, he works as a bouncer/doorman at a local discotheque. Things change when he notices young cleaning woman, Julia (Svarcas) on his monitors, and he becomes fascinated with her to the point of obsession. He starts to wait for her to come out in the morning after work, and shadows her through the streets of Montevideo.
Jara never dares to speak to Julia until he learns that cutbacks at work will mean that she loses her job: he now has to decide whether he will part with her forever or make a decisive move at long last.
Biniez, who had a small part in the acclaimed Uruguayan film Whisky, evidently believes that it is up to the audience to fill in all the empty spaces in a film. There are certainly more than a few here, but somehow Jara is too placid, underdeveloped and bland to spark the viewers' imagination. He is silent most of the time out of choice and while he is sympathetic, he isn't interesting enough to care about and there is nothing in Horacio Camandule's performance to change this impression.
Most of the time, the mood is controlled and subdued. There are a few attempts at levity, but not all of them are successful: a cleaning lady stumbles into a mountain of toilet paper while sweeping the shop's floors; Jara fixes a colleague's aching neck just like he has seen it done on television; he gloats triumphantly after beating his nephew on his playstation. It's all low-key stuff: a bit more punch wouldn't have hurt.
Production companies
Control Z Films
Pandora Films
Rizoma Films
IDTV
ZDF/ARTE
International sales
The Match Factory
(49) 221 539 7090
Executive producers
Fernando Epstein
Agustina Chiarino
Cinematography
Arauco Hernandez
Production designer
Alejandro Castiglioni
Editor
Fernando Epstein
Main cast
Horacio Camandule
Leonor Svarcas
Nestor Guzzini
Federico Garcia
Fabiana Charlo
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Gigante
With: Horacio Camandulle, Leonor Svarcas, Nestor Guzzini, Federico Garcia, Fabiana Charlo, Ernesto Liotti, Diego Artucio, Carlos Maria Lissardy, Nacho Mendy, Augusto Peloso, Dario Peloso, Andres Gallo, Fernando Alonso, Esteban Lago, Rafael Sosa Zeballos, Ariel Cardarelli.
(Spanish dialogue)
By JAY WEISSBERG
A heavy-set supermarket security guard on the night shift develops an unthreatening obsession with a floor cleaner in “Gigante,” Adrian Biniez’s slow-moving feature debut that fails to inject freshness into a one-sided tale. Produced by much of the same team as the superior “Whisky” (which Biniez appears in as thesp), pic fits all the criteria for Hubert Bals funding with its lacklustre pacing and marginal development, though occasional attempts at quirky humor generate a few chuckles. Despite drawbacks, “Gigante” has “festival” written all over, and enough programmers will make bookings to subsidize its world tour.
Thirtysomething Jara (Horacio Camandulle) goes to work with the same dull-footed gait as the rest of the employees, inhabiting that limbo netherworld of the night shift. His job consists of watching his co-workers on video monitors, though nothing much happens except for the occasional minor shoplifting infraction. Then he notices Julia (Leonor Svarcas), a floor cleaner, and he starts taking an interest.
At first it’s just via the shop’s security cameras, but soon Jara tails her on off-hours through Montevideo. It’s immediately apparent the guy is pretty harmless: just another shy metalhead with a maturity level only slightly higher than his pre-teen nephew Matias (Federico Garcia). Watching Julia enjoy a mutant horror pic at the cinema cements his attraction, and as rumors circulate of layoffs at work, Jara’s surveillance takes on ever more protective, though still unspoken, tones.
There’s nothing Hitchcockian, nor even Kieslowskian, about Jara’s obsession, and Biniez doesn’t hint at anything remotely disturbing -- perhaps that’s one of the reasons why the proceedings feel more lifeless than engrossing. Starting as a lopsided love story, with Julia the object of observation, Biniez holds steady to watching Jara watch Julia, never granting the woman herself a life apart and even denying her character speech until the final scene.
Camandulle has a lumbering, almost juvenile physical presence that fits with Jara’s delayed social development, though even when he finally loses control the actor never quite seems to let go of a certain reserve; Svarcas has a lovely smile (commented on in the film) but unfortunately isn’t allowed to project much else.
Pic is not without a sense of visual style, and the helmer’s careful framing and feel for color contrasts hold some interest on screen, though the whole would work much better as a medium-length short. Crucially, Biniez hasn’t figured out how to use the distancing device of surveillance cameras and still maintain appeal: a gag involving Julia knocking down a toilet paper display, seen only from the video monitor, is robbed of comic potential since auds feel completely removed from the action.
Camera (color, digital-to-35mm), Arauco Hernandez; editor, Fernando Epstein; production designer, Alejandro Castiglioni; costume designer, Emilia Carlevaro; sound (Dolby Digital), Daniel Yafalian; associate producers, Stefano Segre, Ronald Meltzer; line producer, Agustina Chiarino; casting, Noelia Burle. Reviewed at Berlin Film Festival (competing), February 8, 2009. Running time: 88 MIN.
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