FILM REVIEWS:
BARRIO TRISTE (Colombia/USA 2025) **
Directed by Stillz
The new crime drama is called BARRIO TRISTE. Many already know the word triste, which in French means sadness. In Spanish, "Barrio Triste" literally translates to "Sad Neighbourhood". It is a term used to describe impoverished and historically marginalized shantytowns in the city of Medellín, Colombia, that have been heavily impacted by poverty and systemic violence. Because of its vivid, poetic name and haunting real-world history, it has become a prominent fixture in Latin American cultural and artistic storytelling: The Film BARRIO TRISTE gained international attention as the title of the acclaimed found-footage crime-drama directed by Colombian-American filmmaker Stillz. The movie follows marginalized teenagers documenting their lives in the 1980s and 1990s.
For his feature directorial debut, STILLZ, best known for his music video work with artists like Bad Bunny, delivers a bold and hallucinatory vision that marks him as a filmmaker to watch. Fans of American auteur Harmony Korine might recognize his thumbprint here (TRASH HUMPERS, KIDS, GUMMO, SPRING BREAKERS), although this is the first film made by Korine’s production house without him at the helm. STILLZ is a photographer and director who has worked on countless music videos for artists including Bad Bunny, Rosalía, Rauw Alejandro, Omar Apollo, and more. He directed the short film in 2023, Doesn’t It Feel Like This Was the Beginning? Barrio Triste is his feature directorial debut. The non-stop soundtrack was composed specifically for the film by avant-garde provocateur ARCA, and it makes the highs and lows of the narrative all the more enthralling.
Th film is not really found footage. A gang of youths steal a filmmaker’s camera at the beginning of the film and start filming themselves and also a robbery they partake. The film looks like cinema verite with a loose narrative and handheld camera techniques, making the film look like found footage. This kind of film can be annoying to many, but it encapsulates a certain realism.
There are a few segments that work well, the one with the bonfire and the two guys wrestling in the background, while others, like the segment with the camera following the light in a dilapidated building with flickering lights, turn out to be repetitive. Some segments make no sense, with the camera just following an imaginary person around corridors in a building in the dark. At times, the film feels and looks like the famous found footage horror film THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT.
The feature debut is from Bad Bunny collaborator STILLZ and features the first original score by Arca; BARRIO TRISTE is a generational portrait of Colombia’s forgotten youth, both personal and specific in its perspective, yet unclassifiable in its formal audacity.
BARRIO TRISTE premiered in Toronto last year at the Toronto International Film Festival. The film opens at the TIFF Lightbox on July 17th.
