Comala

Cassini achieves a strong sense of place with the visuals, and the sound design (opening with an evocative soundscape of police sirens, traffic, and barking dogs) feels unusually vivid and detailed for a non-fiction film. There’s evident care and craft in all of these elements. That said, though, Comala does ultimately begin to feel repetitive and overly contemplative once its patterns are established and its focus begins to shift further inward. Plus, the themes might be better served by giving the interviewees more space to tell their stories.

That would also be beneficial for setting up some further context about the environment and the culture that shaped Cassini’s family. His uncle, for example, tosses off a provocative observation about the way that Mexico’s drug-dealing crime syndicates tend to reinvest their profits into communities and markets while the government stubbornly fails to do so. It’s an argument that, even if not entirely legitimate, could provide more insight into El Jimmy and his milieu if the movie were to pull the thread a little further.

“…expresses a lot of often fascinating viewpoints and emotions…”

But, even as Comala keeps some of its big-picture implications just out of reach, the director still effectively gets across some heart-wrenching thoughts. A major one is the notion that young boys tend to idolize and idealize their fathers, even when they’re absent or indifferent. Cassini clearly sees the error in this, and he compensates with sympathetic portrayals of the women in his life. Of course, that doesn’t necessarily mean he lets his mother or grandmother off the hook – soft-spoken and good-humored as he is, he isn’t afraid to ask them some very uncomfortable questions on camera – but it’s clear that the feminine side of his family has been an endless source of stability.

Comala is very well-made for a first feature, and it should be interesting to see what Cassini is capable of when he’s telling a story that isn’t his. It has to be tough to be so close to the subject matter. While this one doesn’t quite stand with the greatest self-reflective documentaries about families, the undertaking feels well worth the personal struggle it obviously involved.

Comala screened at the 2021 Toronto International Film Festival.