Films: One for the Road

One for the Road
La ultima y nos vamos

Mexico, 2009, 90 Minute Running Time
Genre/Subjects: Coming of Age, Drama, Social Issues, Teen Flick, Women's Issues
Programs: Contemporary World Cinema, Festival de Cine Mexicano, Women + Film
Language: Spanish English Subtitles

DIRECTOR: Eva López Sánchez
Producer: Eva López Sánchez, Alfredo Mier-y-Terán, Carlos Mier-y-Terán
Editor: Mario Sandoval
Screenwriter: Eva López Sánchez, Alfredo Mier-y-Terán
Cinematographer: Javier Morón
Principal Cast: Juan Pablo Campo, Pamela Reiter, Sebasian Hiriat

On a Friday night, three well-off young men looking for action decide to venture across Mexico City – and thus across the class lines dividing its 22 million inhabitants, most of whom they would never otherwise encounter aside from a sales transaction or an incidental glance on the street. Entering this completely foreign and potentially dangerous territory, they receive an eye-opening education like none they have ever had. Rodrigo, who feels smothered by his overprotective mother, eludes his bodyguards and wanders the city streets alone until he climbs aboard a bus and strikes up a friendship with the young woman driver. Also taken for a ride – by two construction workers – is Juan, who is carrying around an expensive antique watch meant to be a gift for his girlfriend’s grandfather. Cristian, meanwhile, goes to a strip club, where he meets a beautiful young stripper named Lucia – and soon finds himself in a street fight.
Director Eva López-Sánchez based this socially aware drama on the real-life experiences of her cowriter and coproducer Alfredo Mier y Terán. The filmmakers did an extensive search over the course of almost two years to find the young talent showcased here. Music is the background to these adventures; the soundtrack offers an eclectic mix of musical styles that includes mariachi and cumbia (a genre originally from Colombia), as well as ballads, country, and hip-hop.

You might also enjoy...

• 

  Fish Tank

  United Kingdom , 2009 , 124 min. Growing up in claustrophobic conditions, 15-year-old Mia finds her rage disappears only when she dances – until her mother brings home a new boyfriend, that is, and life changes drastically.... more
• 

  Heart of Time

  Mexico , 2008 , 90 min. In this political narrative styled as a documentary, a young woman in the volatile Mexican state of Chiapas brings the threat of chaos to her community when she breaks her engagement with a local boy in order to pursue her love for a Zapatista rebel.... more
• 

  Miss Ohio

  USA , 2009 , 85 min. First-time director Gregory Fitzsimmons provides a moving portrait of a lost woman-child, Natalie, who drifts out of an unhappy New York marriage into the drug- and sex-fueled party life of Chicago before turning to Christian fundamentalism.... more
• 

  Northless

  Mexico , 2009 , 93 min. In Oaxacan-born director Rigoberto Perezcano’s first feature, Andrés, a young farmer from the south of Mexico, has made several attempts to cross the border into the United States – all dashed by the danger of the desert.... more
• 

  Raging Sun, Raging Sky

  Mexico , 2008 , 191 min. In the experimental filmmaker Julián Hernández’s mystical celebration of sexual desire, two young lovers are torn apart by circumstance and seek divine guidance to help bring them back together.... more
• 

  West of Pluto

  Canada , 2008 , 95 min. With a bow to Gus Van Sant and Larry Clark, French-Canadian codirectors Myriam Verrault and Henry Bernadet get inside the troubled heads of a group of 15- and 16-year-olds at a suburban Quebec high school, demonstrating that teenage angst knows no national borders.... more