I saw La Bachata del Biónico with a friend last night in a commercial theatre in Santo Domingo, with an audience that laughed out loud throughout. It’s a brilliantly funny film about l’amour fou as lived by a crackhead. El bionico (Manuel Raposo) is crazy in love with La Flaca (Ana Minier), also an addict but now getting clean in a detox centre. The film is shot as a mockumentary in which a film crew follows El Bionico and his sidekick (Calvita) as they try to score a flat worthy of La Flaca so they could set up a home and get married. Their addiction, her ex, and well….life…all get in the way. The tone is up-beat, the pace is raggaeton-y, the world depicted is gritty, with surreal flights that recall magical realism. The film’s achievement is that it’s funny AND touching, that it depicts the pleasures of the drugs, the friendships and community that go along with the addiction, without once minimising its horrors and its sometimes deadly consequences. It’s a real achievement from director Yoel Morales. He has a great feel for the sights and sounds of a particular place in a particular time and conveys it so that it feels a structure of feeling come to life, wonderful to bask in and substantial enough to think upon. Comedy is like the Bermuda Triangle of discussions of national cinemas, they somehow disappear or are minimised in the final accounting. Yet this film brings a culture to life more vividly and with at least as much depth as so called serious films. Hugely enjoyable. I hope it gets picked up for distribution abroad.

José Arroyo