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Piñero review
:. Director: Leon Ichaso
:. Starring: Benjamin Bratt, Giancarlo Esposito
:. Running Time: 1:30
:. Year: 2002
:. Country: USA
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Piñero is sort of a poor man's Before Night Falls. The necessary elements to tell the life of an artist are present but the picture lacks focus.
One caveat in films about artists is that any artist worth his/her salt is an asshole to everyone around them. The exception here is that Piñero, apart from screwing over family and friends, also took his exemplary gifts of charm to the streets, where he robbed strangers and drug dealers. He's an asshole to everyone, all the time. The modern day rock star also shares similar qualities, but at least there's money and access to pretty places for the abused. Piñero offered no such perks, so we must deduce that his despicable and headache-inducing behavior was tolerated (like Pollock or Basquiat and countless others) because his work was something greater. That's the hope in any case.
Benjamin Bratt plays Puerto Rican Miguel Piñero: thief, addict, hustler, prisoner, poet and playwright.
From his days in jail and subsequent awakening of his talents, to scenes of youth (both with his adoring mother and abusive father), to days as the toast of the town and working on Miami Vice and then stealing his friend's TV for drugs and living in the streets, Piñero wasn't looking for approval. In one seen we see him robbing a woman while his great work is being introduced at a theater.
Director/writer Leon Ichaso's efforts are not unnoticed: from the founding of the New Yorican Poet's Café to Piñero's trip to Puerto Rico and finding he's not seen as the second coming of Christ, Ichaso does include some of the historical context needed to understand Piñero's work. Aside from excerpts from a play and some poetry, his work is MIA. The life of the artist, versus the art, is the focus here. As is the jealousy of the artist. This is one of the few films where we see an admirer catch up and surpass him in talent. We watch Piñero help him and then we watch him smolder with jealousy on his friend's opening night.
Benjamin Bratt is certainly far from his days on Law and Order or as Madonna's boyfriend in The Next Best Thing. He buries himself in this role and creates a larger than life figure who nonetheless is hopelessly mired in the mud of daily bad decisions. If Piñero had an iota of Bratt's magnetism, then it becomes obvious why people bothered with him in the first. The rest of the cast is strong, but unfortunately there are too many people and not enough time to really get to know them even though they return repeatedly. Rita Moreno has an interesting role as a mother who dotes on her son and seems to instill in him a love of the arts and pride in cultural identity, but who must certainly feel guilty for the abuse to which she's exposed him. Mandy Patinkin, welcome onscreen anytime, has the thankless role of theater director Joseph Papp who against all reason supports the artist at any cost. The stunning Talisa Soto has no easy task as girlfriend Sugar who waits and waits for something akin to normalcy that won't every happen.
While the film is creatively shot in color and in black and white, sometimes it's just too messy to decipher. Better editing would have made a better, smoother film, as would the deletion of some scenes. While watching Bratt threaten a transvestite that he's going to cut out her liver is humorous in a strange way, it wasn't exactly a crucial moment either.
Piñero requested that his ashes be scattered in the streets where he caroused with hookers and addicts. The funeral scene is very moving and sums up what supporting him meant: watching thousands of particles smash into each other and then float away.
Anji Milanovic
 Movie Reviews: American Films
Reviews 2012 - present
Reviews 1998 - 2012
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