Woodpeckers is the
sixth film by director José María Cabral and his second selected as the Dominican entry
for the Best Foreign Language Film category at next year’s Oscars, an
impressive résumé for one so young.
The film opens inside a prison transport bus, the camera
following new inmate Julian (Jean Jean) in long tracking shots as he submits to
the intake process at Najayo Prison. With almost no delay he’s swept up into
the shifting undercurrents of power and alliances that run through the incarcerated
population. Most of the money Julian smuggled in secures him a place to sleep
other than the floor, although the narrow pallet wedged into a cubby that he’s
assigned doesn’t look much better. Then at dinner Manaury (Ramón
Emilio Candelario), one of the inmates working in the kitchen, slips a baggy of
drugs into Julian’s food. Intended as a bribe, Manaury leverages his “gift” and
less-than-subtle threats to coerce Julian into sending messages to his
girlfriend at the neighboring women’s facility.
This doesn’t involve an underground postal service, or
trained cockroaches à la Orange is the
New Black, though. A corridor at Najayo overlooks the women’s exercise yard
and the prisoners have invented a sign language called “woodpecking” (a
reference to how the men climb up and cling to the bars while they sign, as
well as a couple more explicit double entendres) in order to communicate.
Julian acts the diligent go-between for a time, yet when Yanelly (Judith
Rodriguez Perez) makes it clear she would rather get to know him than talk to
the cheating Manaury, complications arise. In an environment where men can live
and die by their reputations, the long-distance flirtation between Julian and
Yanelly invites retribution from guards and fellow inmates alike.
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| Jean Jean and Judith Rodriguez Perez in Woodpeckers |
If that all sounds a little melodramatic, that’s because it
is. Particularly during the final act, when screenwriting serendipity piles on
top of simmering emotions, the plot can stretch credulity. From start to
finish, Woodpeckers remains a classic
love triangle story at its core, although the prison setting and the
performances by Cabral’s three leads help distinguish it from more clichéd
contemporaries. As the ideal criminal to fall in love with, if such a person
could exist, Jean Jean brings Julian to life with self-interested savviness and
little affectation. Even as he builds relationships both personal and
professional, he navigates Najayo with ghost-like solicitousness, careful not
to get caught stepping on anyone’s toes. Except, of course, for those of the
spurned Manaury, whose jealous histrionics are played with an appropriate touch
of restraint by Candelario.
Ms. Perez is the standout amongst the three, however.
Yanelly crackles with a prideful assurance cultivated well before her prison
sentence and makes it clear to both men that her choices and her
desires are what led to this romantic entanglement. Most of Woodpeckers takes place within the men’s
prison yet by the end the focus has shifted squarely onto Yanelly, who has
gradually transformed from distant love interest into a character in her own
right.
The prison setting also helps to dilute the increasingly
melodramatic tone. Its authenticity is beyond dispute: Woodpeckers was shot on location, using real inmates for every role
except the leads. Perhaps knowing that ahead of time introduces a touch of
bias, or maybe it just explains what one already finds onscreen. Even as the
drama piles up, there’s an emotional honesty in the foundation that keeps Woodpeckers on level ground.
RATING: ★★
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