ISSA LOPEZ’ MEXICAN “TRUE” INSPIRATION. Now in its final stage, the fourth season of the Max trademark series “True Detective,” made history. “Night Country,” this season’s subtitle, is the first to be written and directed by a female filmmaker, Issa Lopez. Executive Series producers Matthew McCounaghey and Woody Harrelson in past seasons has showcased the talents of Asian American directors like Cary Joji Fukunaga (“No Time to Die”) and Justin Lin (“Fast & Furious”), among others.
In the case of Fukunaga, his filmmography already had titles like 2009’s “Sin Nombre,” dealing with the Central American gangs called “Mara Salvatruchas” and starring, among others, Mexican actor Tenoch Huerta (“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.”) Issa Lopez, a Mexican native herself, made her crossover from a prolific filmography south of the border with a remarkable film from 2017 titled originally “Vuelven” (“They’re back) which was known when it opened in US theatres as “Tigers are not afraid” and not only gave her a streaming window on Shudder but also the door for “True Detective: Night Country” as the subject matter has a lot of parallelisms with “Tigers are not afraid”.
“Tigers are not afraid” opens with a prologue which lands us in the consequences in Mexican cities of the war against drug cartels started by the government in 2007 where organized crime has local police scared. These cartels had countless people murdered and disappeared just like the mother of the lead character Estrella. With her mother missing she’s suddenly an orphan who deals with a new reality, mostly going to school even through the classes have to stopped, forcing the teacher and her pupils to lay on the floor during the cartel’s attacks on the city’s streets.
As a remedy for the kids to look away from that violence, Estrella’s teacher (based on a real life situation in the northern city of Monterrey, Mexico), suggests her pupils to make up fairy tales on their heads with princes and wild animals which represent the resilience of the human spirit just like Tigers do.
On that context, Estrella (played by Paola Lara), finds a new family, a kids gang formed by orphans like her who join forces with their own weapons; made up by fantasy and reality to confront the danger that surrounds them.
Written and directed by Issa Lopez, “Tigers are not afraid” makes use of supernatural horror in a way she has given “True Detective 4” its own identity. There’s moments when the ghosts of the murdered and disappeared people help the kids on their own fight against the dangerous cartels run by a political candidate played, not surprisingly, by now cancelled star of the Marvel universe, Tenoch Huerta.
Revisiting “Tigers are not afraid” not only reaffirms us the talent of Issa Lopez as a storyteller but as a valid fortune teller of her times. Oddly right on time when last week’s ProPublica story pointed at the current president of Mexico, voted by popular demand to stop the war against cartels, caused an uproar citing that drug traffickers funneling millions of dollars into his first presidential campaign back in 2006. Lopez Obrador still claims that election “was stolen” by President Felipe Calderon, who started openly the war against the cartels.
Alfredo Galindo is un Productor, Director y Guinista de cine. Columnista del periódico Vanguardia desde 1995, escribe sobre música, cine y televisión. Combina la pasión de escribir con la creación cinematográfica.