Nachtrit (Nightrun/Roadkill, NL 2006), I overheard from an old lady, is good. I probably should not have believed her. The film, like Fame Chimica, is gray in tone and coarse as far as subject matter is concerned. There is no romanticizing of the business of driving taxis here. It's a man's world where violence is a necessary weapon, bald wrestlers are the scare tactics deployed, and angry people are driven to seek trouble. It takes quite some time before the protagonist's struggle becomes more than a personal cause. He takes it upon himself to be the sacrificial lamb, the betrayer and betrayed. A hero with something worth rebelling against or a stubborn cabby walking into an avoidable trap? You decide. I probably would not have thought these squabbles worth sitting through, but with a classy ending like that, maybe it's alright.
The Old World, as this year's Cine Europa tells us, is not all touristy prettiness. Migration and racism are the subject of much debate, as are many unliveable places and unjust situations. Europe knows it cannot escape "honest" representations. However, in the Third World setting, these films lose some of their power. We have problems, too.
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