Tangerine (2015)
Directed by Sean Baker
It's Christmas Eve in Tinseltown and Sin-Dee is back on the block. Upon hearing that her pimp boyfriend hasn't been faithful during the 28 days she was locked up, the working girl and her best friend, Alexandra, embark on a mission to get to the bottom of the scandalous rumor. Their rip-roaring odyssey leads them through various subcultures of Los Angeles, including an Armenian family dealing with their own repercussions of infidelity.
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What critics say influenced Tangerine
While the production comes from the Duplass brothers' stable, there's a touch of Harmony Korine here, a dash of John Waters and an echo of the resourcefulness of Jonathan Caouette, who made his dizzying 2003 memoir, Tarnation, with a little over $200, using iMovie software.
It calls to mind the raggedy energy of the 1980s New York independent film explosion, most notably Spike Lee’s debut “She’s Gotta Have It” in the way it showcases an underrepresented minority in a no-big-deal fashion, with a good amount of raunchy humor instead of any special pleading or self-importance on the filmmaker’s behalf.
If it were possible to time-warp "Tangerine" back a few decades, it could be part of that wave of indies that redefined American cinema in the eighties and nineties, with features like " Go Fish ," "The Living End," "Clerks," "The Brother from Another Planet" and "She's Gotta Have It"— works that, acting- and storytelling-wise, were rough around the edges, but compensated by depicting worlds rarely seen onscreen, with warmth and confidence.
The only time the film really stops moving is during Alex’s nightclub performance of the signature song from Walt Disney’s 1961 live-action musical Babes in Toyland—a potentially mawkish, extreme close-up set-piece (in the mold of Carey Mulligan in Shame) leavened by Sin-Dee’s half-rapt, half-impatient viewing from a corner booth.
Baker’s combination of acute emotional intelligence and raucous, often bawdy humor sometimes brings to mind Fatih Akin, a German filmmaker of Turkish descent who also likes to set his films ( Head-On , The Edge of Heaven , Soul Kitchen ) in tough urban areas where conflicting cultural value systems meet and clash.
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Baker’s combination of acute emotional intelligence and raucous, often bawdy humor sometimes brings to mind Fatih Akin, a German filmmaker of Turkish descent who also likes to set his films ( Head-On , The Edge of Heaven , Soul Kitchen ) in tough urban areas where conflicting cultural value systems meet and clash.
Para mí la decisión resulta no sólo brillante sino inevitable porque resalta la sordidez del medio que está capturando, mientras, por otra parte, establece su lugar dentro de la tradición de cine kitsch de directores como John Waters, que hizo comer a Divine una caca de perro para probar que era la chica más sucia en Flamencos rosas (Pink Flamingos, 1972).
Baker’s combination of acute emotional intelligence and raucous, often bawdy humor sometimes brings to mind Fatih Akin, a German filmmaker of Turkish descent who also likes to set his films ( Head-On , The Edge of Heaven , Soul Kitchen ) in tough urban areas where conflicting cultural value systems meet and clash.
Tangerine certainly owes a debt to Richard Linklater's classic Slacker, in the way it ambles around from character to character and from situation to situation.
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“Tangerine” has a number of interlinked plot strands along with an episodic, anecdotal structure that reminded me a little of early Jim Jarmusch movies, especially “Mystery Train” and “Night on Earth.”
“Tangerine” has a number of interlinked plot strands along with an episodic, anecdotal structure that reminded me a little of early Jim Jarmusch movies, especially “Mystery Train” and “Night on Earth.”