DUCK SEASON - DVD review

Sometimes a movie can look like a million and be worth two cents. Other times a movie can look like two cents and be worth a million. "Duck Season," the 2004 release from Mexican director Fernando Eimbcke may not matter all that much, but it does wonders with a tiny budget.

Of course, the film didn't make much more than two cents at the box office in the United States, and we might have expected that, given that it is a small Mexican film, entirely character and dialogue-driven, shot in black-and-white, with English subtitles. Sadly, that probably eliminates about 99.9% of moviegoers in the U.S. But for the viewer interested in an amusing, thoughtful, independent, slice-of-life film that despite its slow tempo is long on charm, "Duck Season" makes a fascinating alternative to the higher-priced spreads.

"Duck Season" moves along, as I say, at a snail's pace and tends to take its own good time in settling into any kind of rhythm. Then, once there, it still doesn't develop much of a central conflict. Nevertheless, it casts a spell over the viewer. The film's quartet of no-name actors play characters who at first seem remote but warm up surprisingly fast. By the time the film is through, you wonder what it was all about, which is part of the fun. The director makes you think about it, and the longer the film lingers in memory, the better it gets. It must have lingered in film judges' minds pretty strongly, too, because the movie was nominated for and won any number of prizes at various movie festivals around the world.

The story concerns four people, three teenagers and a youngish adult. The opening still shots set the tone as the director shows us a large, sterile city on a lazy Sunday afternoon; a bicycle with a flat tire; a broken-down basketball hoop; and a series of tall, blank, ugly buildings. What are two fourteen-year-old boys, Flama (Daniel Miranda) and Moko (Diego Catano), to do on such a dreary day? They are at Flama's apartment, and his mother has just gone out. Why, it's time for pizza, Coke, potato chips, and video games, naturally!

That is, until the power goes out. Oh-oh. They find themselves stuck with each other to pass the time. Then the cute, sixteen-year-old girl next door, Rita (Danny Perea), comes over to borrow Flama's oven to bake a cake and winds up staying longer than she thought; and a pizza delivery guy in his mid twenties, Ulises (Enrique Arreola), comes by to deliver the food the boys ordered and winds up staying the afternoon in a dispute over who is going to pay the bill.

When the electricity temporarily goes back on, the fellows try to cram in as much video-game playing ("Halo" and soccer) time as they can, hardly noticing the girl in the kitchen, but then it goes off again. It's here, with the power off for the second and final time, that the two boys really find themselves bored out of their skulls.

Then Rita notices a painting on the wall of ducks in flight, which, surprisingly, leads to the narrative's central themes. What does it mean to be free? What does it mean to know where you're going? The boys only understand that they're young and resentful at having to live with their parents. Besides, Flama's parents are splitting up, and to him they seem more interested in who is going to get to take the duck picture than in what will happen to their son. Meanwhile, it's Rita's birthday, and she's baking herself a cake because nobody in her family remembered. And the pizza guy feels stuck in a life he didn't count on, even though he has plans to escape.

It is not until about halfway through the film that we begin to see the purpose in all this. Rita becomes flirtatious in the kitchen with the ultra-shy Moko. Moko fantasizes about his repressed sexual feelings for his friend Flama. Flama broods on the separation of his parents. Ulises explains his plans to better himself. The four young people argue, fight, eat, laugh, play, dance, bond, inadvertently get high, and grow closer as they learn more about each other, forced to do so by finally being able to face one another with no television set or video game or parent to keep them apart. In other words, they discover the joy of sharing.

As an audience, we recall the difficulties of growing up, dealing with adults, dealing with sex, wanting security while searching for identity and a place in life, finding out who we are, and what our dreams are made of. And it ain't over 'til it's over: Wait through the closing credits.

"Duck Season" is not a particularly deep or penetrating film; it's just one that reminds you half-humorously, half-wistfully of yourself and your own goals and ambitions, your own relationships with friends and family, and your own ways of dealing with the boredom and sameness of the world around you. A viewer could spend a worse ninety minutes.

Video:
The look of the film is not exactly something that is going to inspire awe in a person. The black-and-white photography shows up cleanly but with very average detailing, delineation, and contrast. It looks more like a good video tape than a "Lawrence of Arabia." The anamorphic picture, which fills out a 16x9 television, is a tad glossy, a tad soft, yet a tad overbright, too.

Audio:
The Dolby Digital 5.1 sound is also a tad soft, but it does do a good job with the soundtrack music, even providing a pounding deep bass when necessary. The front channels offer up a wide stereo field, and the rear speakers fill in a good deal of musical ambience. You'll find a good number of realistic surround effects, too, although they are nothing spectacular. As the entire movie takes place in several rooms of a high-rise apartment, the sounds you'll hear are things like a dripping faucet, ticking clocks, and video games.

Extras:
Warner Bros. offer next to nothing in the way of extras on the disc. There are two trailers available at start-up only, "Grilled" and "Ushpizin," and on the menu a widescreen theatrical trailer for "Duck Season." Other than that, there are nineteen scene selections; no chapter insert; Spanish as the only spoken language; and English, French, and Spanish subtitles.

Parting Thoughts:
I have to admit that from the movie's first thirty minutes or so, I thought I was going to hate it. You have to wait for "Duck Season" to unfold, and even then it's pretty slow going. Moreover, you will find no great insights into human behavior in it, no great performances worthy of international applause, no great cinematography, no special effects of any kind. You will not find much of anything out of the ordinary, in fact, except a sweet slice of life that probably has more meaning after you watch the picture and have time to think about it. At least it's not a movie you'll forget two minutes after you see it, and that in itself may be worth something.