Break Of Dawn (Rompe El Alba)

 

Picture: C     Sound: C+     Extras: D     Film: B-

 

 

Pedro J. Gonzalez (Oscar Chavez) had fought in Pancho Villa’s revolution, but now he must face racism and other discrimination when he comes to the United States in 1928 to be a singer in Break Of Dawn (1988), writer/director Isaac Artenstein’s look at the true story of the revolutionary who became a music star, but could not stay apolitical.

 

Gonzalez wants the American Dream and feels he can do it with music.  After a failed attempt to sell himself as a musician, he successfully appeals to the station manager to let him do ads in Spanish for that community.  Sales jump, then he risks it all with a sudden music performance.  He gets fired, only to be rehired when his one performance is a smash hit.  Political forces take notice and he becomes involved in the usual Los Angeles corruption, including a Mexican go-between (the great character actor Tony Plana, now on TV’s remarkable Resurrection Blvd., reviewed elsewhere on this site) and the stakes are high.

 

It is one of those rare films “based on a true story” that actually matters.  I was impressed in how well old Los Angeles going into the 1930s was recreated.  They may not have had the budget of Chinatown, The Two Jakes or L.A. Confidential, but it works well and looks good.  I also very much liked the recreation of the early days of radio, more convincing than the many recent attempts we have seen. 

 

The full frame 1.33 X 1 image is an older analog transfer, but despite the constant softness and muted colors, you can still tell the fine job cinematographer Stephen Lighthill pulled off.  Now, I want to see this on a 35mm print.  The Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono is good enough to hear the dialogue (spilt between English and Spanish, with English subtitles burned into the print that are above the usual).  There are no extras.

 

The film ends abruptly and that’s a shame.  It has been a while and an update in an extra would have been nice, but this film also had its limits via its low budget.  Though it will be hard to top this cast, I would like to see this film get remade, because a darker and more complex tale is still to be told.  I will add that Break Of Dawn (which refers to when he had his own radio show, as not to interfere with  the assumedly “white” broadcast day, among other things) does not shy away form some of the darkness.  This was made before the more recent breakthroughs in U.S. Pop Culture for Latino artists, so that in itself is an achievement.  It is a solid film that deserves to be seen again and belongs in the same area of Chinatown, The Two Jakes or L.A. Confidential, even if it is not as realized.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo