A Cop Movie

Far from being copraganda, A Cop Movie, the new feature from director Alonso Ruizpalacios (“Güeros,” “Museo”), is a formally daring and incisive deep dive into their performance of authority.

Director Alonso Ruizpalacios’ exciting and unpredictable look at a pair of Mexico City police officers blends documentary and narrative techniques to deliver a refreshing and innovative look at the challenges of modern-day police work — as well as the underlying corruption that makes the most earnest officers vulnerable to a system rigged against them.

Along with its trenchant, revelatory depictions and discussion of police work and related political ills, A Cop Movie pulls these hidden vectors of image-making, opinion-shaping power to the fore.

A Cop Movie, directed by Alonso Ruizpalacios, is exceptionally challenging to begin with. As the movie unspools, and the layers of its production become clearer, we understand the challenge is the movie’s entire objective—up to a point.

Ambitious, heady and distinctive, if easier to admire in theory than engage with moment to moment, A Cop Movie has a conceptual strangeness that’s difficult to overstate.

A Cop Movie is too gentle to rouse new disdain for an institution currently subject to such piercing critique. It chooses to make the self-consciousness about its subject matter into a twee form of guilty self-awareness, when what’s needed is bitter medicine, or just insights that better challenge our moral certainties.

A Cop Movie is a slick exploration/explanation of Mexican policing. But as the style drifts from first-person, dash-cam point of view “reality” to a laughably generic foot chase through the city and onto the subway, it becomes obvious that believing what we see and hear is meant to matter here. And the gimmicks undercut that too many times along the way.

It's difficult for a movie to have a surprising twist, let alone two or three. 'A Cop Movie,' the new film by Alonso Ruizpalacios, not only incorporates them organically into the plot but makes them a getaway to different genres. From black comedy to drama; from drama to thriller; from behind-the-scenes clips to thriller, and from behind-the-scenes clips to documentary. What the Mexican has done is brilliant in every way. I knew of several of the surprises that awaited here, and yet I was shocked by the final reveal, which encapsulates everything that came before into a stark and sad tale that leaves you clenching your fist tightly. Ruizpalacios explores both sides of the coin: the Mexican policeman as a victim and as a perpetrator. Remaining impartial in the face of what this controversial figure means for society, the director, whatsoever, does not remain silent in the face of injustice, making visible the corruption and rottenness within the police force, and also those individuals committed to duty, or with the obligation of providing for their families. Kind advice: For best effect, it's best to watch this movie knowing little about it.

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]