Viva Mexico Month II Quick Picks and Pans

Rapiña (1975) Porfirio (Ignacio López Tarso), a poor woodcutter, witnesses an airplane crash in the mountains near his home. He picks through the bodies and wreckage for valuables, hording his collection in a nearby cave. He brings his brother-in-law, Evodio (Germán Robles), to the crash site, to gather more of the dead’s belongings before the authorities arrive. Porfirio’s lofty ambitions for his family quickly erode into madness, as his greed gives into paranoia and eventually murder. Much like his brilliant later film, Poison for the Fairies (1982), writer/director Carlos Enrique Taboada has constructed another insightful, mesmerizing study of the worst aspects of human nature. Rating: ****. Available on Blu-ray (included in the Severin box set, Mexican Gothic: The Films of Carlos Enrique Taboada) and DVD (Out of print) Museo (2018) In this fictionalized account of a real-life incident, two bored 20-something ne’er-do-wells, Juan and Benjamin (Gael García Bernal and Leonardo…