burnt money is the perfect festival film .
it will show once or twice , and then no one , thankfully , will ever have to hear from it again .
this film from the seattle international film festival 2001’s emerging masters series is easily one of the year’s worst .
billed as a gay `bonnie and clyde’ , this gritty film from director marcelo pi ? eyro has its only highlight in a well-designed title sequence .
two gay lovers get involved in a bank robbery that makes a gang leader , whose plan they screwed up , angry .
this causes the gang leader to send his boys out to get the gay guys , one of whom may not actually be gay .
hiding out in a prostitute’s apartment , the two men must fight off police and gang members in a very long showdown for the movie’s conclusion .
if caught , they risk losing all the money , and their love .
as an added emotional bonus , one of the gay men is dying .
or something like that .
everything that happens is so quick and confusing i was completely lost .
clarity isn’t exactly this movie’s striving virtue , so it was a little hard to pick up .
not much could have really happened though .
the main events in this long two-hour film are explicit homosexual and heterosexual sex , graphic drug use , extreme violence , and strong language .
lots of explicit material is never a bad thing when there’s a reason , but there’s no purpose to anything in this film .
most of the sex and violence scenes come off as silly , while the heavy drug use comes off as ridiculous and depressing .
it appears pi ? eyro ( who co-wrote with marcelo figueras , from a novel by ricardo piglia ) purposefully adds more blood and lovemaking for his own amusement .
he makes the actors as sweaty and dirty as possible , makes them snort cocaine , gives them guns and condoms , and lets them go .
burnt money is pointless .
the performances are bad .
it tries to thrill and shock , but only causes boredom .
god forbid it will ever get a distributor .
another disappointing film from this year’s so-called emerging masters series .
pass on by .