Gerardo Naranjo’s savage, bullet riddled, all-encompassing torrid thriller featuring a full scale border-war demonstrates the prowess of an auteur filmmaker who up until 2011 was labeled as an art-house rebel with the low budget experimental “Drama/Mex,” and French New Wave influenced Voy a explotar. In comparison with these previous entries, Miss Bala counts as a monumental shift way in aesthetic, shape and form. With a brilliantly choreographed outline, Naranjo borrows from fact, takes a piercing/critical stance and depicts a society that is held hostage via a symbolic lead figure, who at times emblematically represents the “route” nature of the drug trade. After stops in Cannes (Un Certain Regard) and Toronto, NYFF was where we caught up with the filmmaker and his lead, Stephanie Sigman in this roof top sit down. Interview was conducted by Sean Glass. Fox International releases the film in theaters and on VOD this Friday.
