In ‘The Paranoids’ (2008) we are thrown into the claustrophobic inner world of Luciano Gauna, (Daniel Hendler) who works as a unenthusiastic entertainer at kid’s parties, dressed as an enormous purple monster. His real desire is to complete his first screenplay for a feature film. His whole world seems to conspire to humiliate him in one way or another.
Decisions of any kind are a traumatic experience and he has little true independence as he lives in his friend Manuel’s apartment, (which Manuel will not live in because his grandmother died there). Luciano spends more time fretting about the building’s porter catching him smoking a spliff, or dancing and singing to very loud rock music in his room, than actually writing anything much more than scribbling in the notebook that he permanently carries around.
Luciano’s friend Manuel (Walter Jakob) now lives in Spain and has been very successful with a TV series called ‘The Paranoids’. When Manuel and his girlfriend Sofia (the enigmatic Jazmin Stuart) return to Argentina, his overpowering attempts to ‘help’ Luciano simply end up exacerbating Luciano’s temperamental vulnerabilities. Manuel is apparently totally unaware of how deeply he can hurt with his casual but cruel manner. In the end this also provokes Luciano to rethink his life, especially when Sofia decides to stay in his apartment for a few days. There is a strong frisson between them as she is attracted to the very qualities that Manuel sees as signs of weakness.
Hendler describes the character of Luciano as: “… a combination of repressed, paranoid and phobic emotions. He has an internal strength that he has not yet developed, controlled by a deep rage that prevents any fluidity of thought and makes him evermore auto-destructive.”
Written by Gabriel Medina and Nicolás Gueiburt, ‘The Paranoids’ is classified as a romantic comedy. Medina has said that Gauna is his ‘alter -ego’ and there is an autobiographical element as many of the things that take place in the movie, actually happened to him. There is an underlying irony and humour, and Medina admits he was influenced by “El Sueño de los Héroes, by Adolfo Bioy Casares. His aim was to create a contradictory but unusual romantic comedy. It is Medina’s debut feature, having previously filmed shorts, worked as producer, editor and scriptwriter.
The lead actor, Hendler, is a master at conveying his extreme discomfort at social interaction. Present in almost every scene, he conveys Luciano ‘s phobic attitude which contrasts with the effortless ease of the voluble Manuel, who criticizes Luciano’s difficulties at every turn. Despite being a ‘serious’ actor, Hendler is able to express total abandon when singing and dancing to the heavy rock track of “Féretro” by the band ‘Todos tus Muertos’.
As with this terrific track, the overall Sound Design of the film and the music is well paced and the tracks effectively compliment the story line. The camerawork of DOP Lucio Bonelli has an intimate quality, with atmospheric lighting that becomes a part of the story, with black outs and all.
The film has garnered a clutch of nominations at the BAFICI (Argentina) and the Silver Condor Prize, later it won Best Actor for Daniel Hendler and Special Jury Prize at the Biarritz Festival of Latin American Cinema, later Best Actor and Best First Feature at the Lima Festival of Film, and Best Film at the International Festival of Contemporary Film. Now you can judge for yourselves.
official trailer: https://youtu.be/OBEGof6rJlY
The Paranoids (2008) DVD will be realease by Network Releasing fromJuly 16th 2018.
Director - Gabriel Medina
Screenplay - Nicolas Gueilburt, Gabriel Medina
Producer - Sebastian Aloi
Cinematography - Lucio Bonelli
Cast: Daniel Hendler, Martin Feldman, Walter Jakob, Jazmin Stuart. Miguel Dedovich
