Repeating Islands

La lucha de Ana is a new film from the Dominican Republic, directed by Bladimir Abud and written by Abud and Alfonso Suárez. The cast includes Cheddy García, Esmaylin Morel, Antonio Zamudio, Karina Noble, and Victor Checo.

This is Abud’s first feature film. The director, who studied at the Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo, directed the documentary Un joven llamado Juan Bosch [A Man Named Juan Bosch, 2010], a film centering on the contributions of former president Juan Bosch to Dominican culture. Among other, his short films include “Medios,” winner of the Santo Domingo Festival and “Prenda,” which received special mentions in Funglode 2008 and the International Film Festival of Chile in 2009.

Description: Ana sells flowers at the local market. When her beloved son is murdered by a rich, entitled young man in a drug deal gone awry, Ana will have to take on a corrupt judicial system – and a complacent society – to seek justice.

See excerpts, translated from the Spanish originals, with links to the full reviews below:

Ana’s son [. . .] becomes an innocent victim of an environment marked by criminality and the world of drugs surrounding him. Although the young man never got involved in drugs, his bad company drives him to a tragic outcome that ends his life. Following this event, Ana begins a struggle marked by a trafficking of influences in a country where those with the most money and power can remain virtually untouched consequences for any offense and pretty much do as they please; therefore, for Ana attainment of justice, she must make use of a variety of tools.

The film portrays perfectly the reality of life in our neighborhoods, especially those existing on the outskirts of large cities—between skyscrapers, trains, luxury and rapid development—where the dispossessed people, however, live a very different life, a scenario where the power of drugs, weapons, and crime constitute the law, and where those who must implement the law and social order respond to their own interests; despite their knowledge of the delinquency, they do nothing to eradicate this evil. La Lucha de Ana also presents a world where many young people are into drugs and crime as a way out of the inefficiency of the state, because in this arena provides them with all the tools necessary to survive and get ahead.

See preview here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsY1odXgp1A

For reviews in Spanish, see http://www.hd.com.do/2012/05/la-lucha-de-ana/ and http://www.listin.com.do/entretenimiento/2012/5/25/233857/La-lucha-de-Ana