Chop Shop (2007) released 2008

This movie has 3 Independent Spirit Award nominations: for the director Ramin Bahrani, who wrote the script and also won last year's Independent Spirit Someone to Watch Award; for the director of photography Michael Simmonds; and for the star, young Alejandro Polanco. The DVD included a trailer for Bahrani's Man Push Cart (2005), which looked good. Chop Shop is about a 12 year old orphan in Queens NY with a strong work ethic: he's smart, he never stops working, and he always counts his money. The cinematography nomination was well deserved: Jack & I commented to each other what a good job he did day and night, with long lens shots, rainstorms, puddles, elevated trains, and Shea Stadium. It does have a slow pace: after about a half hour I turned to Jack and said, "When is something going to happen?" Right around then, something did. Yet we were pulled in to the life of this boy and those around him. Polanco is in just about every scene, and carries the movie effortlessly. He is another one to watch. Without a traditional three-act plot, without flashbacks, we observe a few weeks in the life of a society that I knew little about. I was grateful for the DVD-supplied English captions, which covered the occasional Spanish words as well, because sometimes the mix left the dialogue too quiet for me to hear. Though it's about a 12 year old, it probably is appropriate for older, mature teens and above, due to sexual situations and language.