Pelo malo

Nine-year-old Junior is a boy with a beautiful head of curls in a poor district of Caracas. He doesn’t join in playing football with the local kids, dislikes his curls and dreams of being photographed as a pop star with beautiful straight hair. When he fanatically starts straightening his hair again, his mother - a sacked security guard - gets angry. She’s afraid he’s gay, and that does not bode well in Caracas. While she feels guilty and veers between worried and indifferent, Junior’s grandma doesn’t seem to think it’s a problem.
Mariana Rondón came to Rotterdam in 1999 with A la medianoche y media. Now she observes the fight without judging and in an almost documentary style, as she does Junior’s complicated friendship with a local girl and the mother’s attempts to get her job back. Complex and confusing feelings against the raw background of Venezuela. The film won prizes in Thessaloniki (FIPRESCI) and San Sebastián.