Review: ‘Amigo’
You don't need to know a thing about the Philippine-American War to pick up on why writer-director John Sayles has set his new movie during that period. "Amigo" may take place in 1900, but its story of U.S. occupation of a foreign land is surprisingly relevant to our ongoing excursions in Iraq and elsewhere. Sayles is a great independent filmmaker ("Lone Star") who's no stranger to lacing his stories with political commentary, but unfortunately "Amigo" is one of his weaker efforts. His intentions are honorable, but in the end all he has are intentions -- and not enough drama.
"Amigo" takes us to a small rural village in the Philippines that's been overrun by U.S. forces led by Lt. Compton (Garret Dillahunt), a tough-minded but fair officer. While several of his subordinates -- not to mention his commanding officer, Col. Hardacre (Sayles regular Chris Cooper) -- treat the Filipinos with contempt, Compton respects the village's soft-spoken mayor, Rafael (Joel Torre), despite the language barrier between them. Unfortunately, both men are in danger because of Rafael's brother Simon (Ronnie Lazaro), who commands a team of guerillas trying to rid their land of the Americans.
Despite being one of our most thoughtful and iconoclastic indie filmmakers, Sayles is never someone known for his subtlety, and his blunt point-making is particularly problematic with "Amigo," which never misses an opportunity to underline and highlight any parallel between America's current Middle East adventures and our occupation of the Philippines a century ago. This isn't to say that such parallels aren't there or aren't important to consider -- sadly, the U.S. was waterboarding long before Iraq -- but Sayles doesn't let them unspool in compelling ways. Mostly, he just drops them on the audience in waves as if it's a contest to find the most similarities.
That bluntness extends to many of the characters, which are usually a strength of Sayles' work. But not with "Amigo": There are very clearly the "good guys" and the "bad guys," with several of the central roles essentially serving as specific ideologies. Most disappointing, Sayles (who has shown skill in the past at bringing other cultures to life, such as the unnamed Central America nation in "Men With Guns") simplifies his Filipino characters into noble representations of "quiet dignity" and "angry defiance." Sayles doesn't want us to understand anybody on the screen beyond the roles he's assigned them, which makes every one of them feel like chess pieces he's moving around the board for his own purposes.
If "Amigo" has a saving grace, it's Sayles' long-running ability to immerse us in his worlds, whether it's the Texas of "Lone Star," the Alaska of "Limbo," or the South of "Honeydripper." Ironically, "Amigo's" locations are more colorful than the characters in them. (The film's press notes make a big deal of the fact that the movie was shot entirely in the Philippines, and you can feel the hot, humid weather sticking to your skin.) And with that sense of place, "Amigo" does manage to convey an atmosphere of dislocation in which different peoples are forced to coexist in the same region for very different reasons. But you never feel that Sayles is exploring or discovering anything in "Amigo." Basically, he doesn't like what the U.S. has been doing in Iraq and throughout the Middle East, and he's going to say it as loudly as he can. But it's not cathartic or liberating. He's just using another war to preach to the same old choir.
Grade: C
