An excellent Argentine selection box of intricate short stories; crazy, caustic, and ingeniously clever.
Wild Tales
[rating=4]
Wild by Dave O’Flanagan
Writer/director Damián Szifrón’s series of six short stories is a glowing example of the narrative depth attainable through the medium of short story. Each tale unrelated – apart from a healthy dose of revenge coursing through their veins – the freedom enables Szifrón to pump each segment full of as much ambition, madness and fantasy as possible. Featuring the cream of the crop of Argentinian acting talent (including Ricardo Darín as a demolitions expert bent on revenge and Leonardo Sbaraglia as a yuppie pursued with feverish intensity by a vengeful stranger), each of the stories is beautifully shot, perfectly structured and wonderfully acted. It’s also impressive how in spite of the zippy narrative, each of the characters feel fully realised. The ingenuity of many of the films set pieces is testament to a director with an obvious talent for compositional astuteness. Wickedly funny and thrilling to the last, Wild Tales does exactly what it says on the tin.
Wild Tales is showing on Oct 12th & 15th at the 58th BFI London Film Festival
