Reviews of Cartel Land

1/27/17

The critics of the New York Times and Variety seem to have similar ideas about the captivating film which Matthew Heineman produced. The writer at the NY times talks about his opinion on Foley and how he seems to be driven by racist motives. This idea was similar to what I thought in my blog post about Trump and his wall and how much of the efforts going into border control is rooted from racism for people of other cultures. The writer at variety also addresses Foley's seemingly purehearted intentions which were tainted by racist motives. I thought this was true because there's no doubt that when hunting down the same race of people who happen to be committing the same crime, that racism ideas and motives would arise. While there were many aspects of the reviews which i agreed with, there were certain points I oppose

The writer at the NY times debates if the documentary is a true narrative, due to the lack of focus on certain vigilante details which were left out. I thought it was an excellent narrative which highlight the more interesting and necessary parts of the story. I think that Heineman probably did get more information and footage but chose to leave it out because of his own judgement on what he wanted the documentary to capture,

Some differences I see with real reviews and my personal summary is the use of colorful diction to frame the story in a positive light while still including the unfavorable aspects of it. My review was very informal and slightly one sided where as the reviews were brief yet captured the positives and negatives of the movie and including some opinion.