Los olvidados (The young and the damned) 1950 - Gritty realism in the world of juvenile delinquents

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IMDB rating: 8,1

Director: Luis Bunuel
Main Cast: Estela Inda, Miguel Inclan, Alfonso Mejia, Roberto Cobo, Alma Delia Fuentes

"The winner of two Cannes Film Festival awards, Luis Buñuel's Los Olvidados (aka The Forgotten Ones and The Young and the Damned) was the director's first international box-office success. Yet Buñuel showed no signs of curbing the outrageous iconoclasm that made him famous in Europe and South America; one of the more lasting images of the film is the clash-of-cultures shot of a glistening new skyscraper rising above the squalid slums of Mexico City. The story concerns a gang of juvenile delinquents, whose sole redeeming quality is their apparent devotion to one another. Part of the film's perverse fascination is watching Buñuel's street punks cause misery to those less fortunate. The audience immediately identifies with Pedro (Alfonso Mejía), the youngest gang member, who evinces a spark of decency; yet Pedro, like the others, remains a victim of circumstances far beyond his control.Throughout, Buñuel maintains an objective tone; it is our responsibility, not his, to judge the gang members. In Buñuel's universe, mothers turn their backs on their sons and sleep with their friends, blind beggars play sexual games with young girls, wealthy men proposition young boys, and cripples are so venomous that one feels little or no sympathy for them when they're attacked. The film's sole compassionate adult, the warden of a juvenile home, is decent and caring but ineffectual, an easily surmounted obstacle to the corruption of the outside world.
Seasoned with haunting dream sequences, Los Olvidados was the opening volley in what would turn out to be Buñuel's most creative period." - www.allmovie.com

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