The beauty of the evil
El Angel
Film. The magnetic Lorenzo Ferro embodies Carlitos, a serial killer and an evil angel which shook Argentina of 1970’s. Terribly good !
By Franck Lebraly
“The word is up to robbers and artists”, this punchline pulled from the movie could resume this little Argentine jewel. The director Luis Ortega tells an anecdote which undermine his country in 1971. The Angel is produced by Almodovar, and we understand why : Carlitos, face of androgynous angel, is a high school student who commit the worst of the evils : thefts, robberies, murders… When he meets the dark Ramon, they pushed the evil doors on a frenetic Hispano rock background.
”The word is up to robbers and artists
Regardless its violence, The Angel renew the landscape of gangter movies. The light, the sun, the music and all its esthetic makes it a typical pop product. Served by the crazy face of Lorenzo Ferro, angel or devil, killer with a clear conscience, robber and player, but disrupted by his sexual tendencies. In reality, the real Carlos “Carlitos” Robledo Puch, a life prisoner, claim loud his attraction for women and he doesn’t accept his transposition to the screen.
Narrative asset, the ambiguous relation between Carlos and Ramon, played by Chino Darin (the Ricardo Darin’s son), without being strictly speaking a romance, give a couple of gangsters halfway between Sailor & Lula and Freddie Mercury & Ziggy Stardust. The violence scenes are staggering, almost funny, charmingly dumped, but fun (like the twin sisters behind their motorcycle males) and we can’t wait to see again this two young actor in this Argentine cinema in perpetual renewal.
