The City

The city in question is New York, but could be anywhere in the US with a sizeable Latin American population. Four stories depict telling experiences. 'Bricks' concerns labourers taken off the streets to a site on the edge of town to clean bricks; 'Home' sees a boy new to town strike up a relationship with a girl met at a wedding party; in 'The Puppeteer' an illegal immigrant tries to get his child into school; and in 'Seamstress' a woman working in a sweatshop becomes desperate when she learns her daughter back home is ill. While none of the individual tales in Riker's low budget indie is at all complex in terms of dramaturgy, their uncluttered simplicity makes not only for overall credibility, but for a steady accumulation of emotional power. While the fundamental inhumanity of a system that marginalises the Latins is mercifully never rammed down our throats, it's easy to infer from the lucid narrative, the sturdy performances, and the elegant b/w 'Scope camerawork.