Mad Bills to Pay (or Destiny, dile que no soy malo)

Rico möchte möglichst bald reich werden. Fürs Erste aber verscherbelt der 19-Jährige nur Billigfusel-Mixgetränke am Strand der New Yorker Bronx. Als er die minderjährige Destiny schwängert, zieht sie zu ihm – in die beengte Wohnung, in der er mit Mutter und Schwester lebt. Kein Ort für leise Auseinandersetzungen. Mit halbdokumentarisch aus der Ecke linsender Kamera porträtiert Joel Alfonso Vargas seine ebenso problematische wie unerschütterlich optimistische Hauptfigur. Der Regisseur entstammt selbst der dominikanischen Community, von der er erzählt – in einem der frischesten Entwürfe, die das US-Independent-Kino in diesem Jahr zu bieten hat. (Gian-Philip Andreas)

In Anwesenheit von Joel Alfonso Vargas und am 23.10. auch von Paolo Maria Pedullà (Produzent).

On the idyllic coast of Orchard Beach, the Bronx, nineteen-year-old Rico hustles through the summer days with a cooler full of homemade cocktails, earning money to party and hang out. He lives in a close-knit Dominican community with his sister and mother, and their home is equal parts fun and constant shouting, half in English, half in Spanish. The everyday madness of a home full of teenagers grows even more chaotic once Rico brings his pregnant sixteen-year- old girlfriend Destiny to live with them. Rico is stubbornly set on building a proper new family, though he still lacks the necessary tools to do. MAD BILLS TO PAY (OR DESTINY, DILE QUE NO SOY MALO) is the loving portrait of a situation both tender and absurd, as these young lovers spend the hot New York summer nights trying to become adults from one day to the next. Structured in blocks of games, chats and drama shot in long, wandering single takes and assembled with a fast, unpredictable montage, we witness an extended family coming to life and taking on a very particular form. Tiny catastrophes inform the love that flows forth in this new community, where the neighbourhood sets the pace and people grow up way too fast. A cinematic definition of growing pains. (Lucía Salas)

Joel Alfonso Vargas: NUBE (2027, K), TARGET IS HIRING (2017, K), SHADOW (2024, K), QUE TE VAYA BONITO, RICO (2024, K)