But for an ensemble comedy, there’s too little animation in the characters’ interplay, yielding frequent flat stretches in the early scenes. Much of the humor comes from Robbins, as a familiar brand of gonzo dude who juggles his adrenaline highs with smart-mouthed deadpan ennui. But Leon de Aranoa seems convinced the script (written with Diego Farias) is a lot funnier than it actually is. The actors are all more than capable of breathing definition into their characters, and Del Toro in particular shows his usual sleepy-eyed charm.

“Where’d you get her?” cracks B about the Russian beauty. Potential conflict arises when Mambru’s prickly former lover Katya (Olga Kurylenko) is assigned to tag along with them while she evaluates whether it still makes sense to have aid workers stationed in the area. But obtaining the rope needed for the task proves difficult. Whether the body was dropped there by enemies or by enterprising locals planning to sell water at inflated prices is unclear. They need to remove the corpse of an obese man from a well before one of the last water sources not booby-trapped with mines is irreversibly contaminated. The droll dilemma that drives the action over a 24-hour period is a typically double-edged problem. Their interpreter Damir ( Fedja Stukan) is a soulful local who points out early on that their humor is among his people’s most valuable resources. Veteran logistics guy B ( Tim Robbins) is a reckless type with an unpredictable streak, who chooses not to be serious even in life-or-death situations like navigating possible land mines. He’s flanked by French newcomer Sophie ( Melanie Thierry), a water and sanitation expert who brings both the idealism and the vulnerability of inexperience. The head of the small Aid Across Borders unit in a rugged mountain area is Mambru ( Benicio Del Toro), who is weighing with some degree of ambivalence whether to return to the U.S., where his girlfriend is pressuring him to settle down. See more Cannes: The Red-Carpet Arrivals (Photos) Exposed to numbing atrocities, maddening bureaucratic tangles and ever-shifting jurisdictions as reality struggles to keep up with the progress of peace talks, they face a daily battle not to let their cynicism erase their compassion. The unsung, socially committed, nonviolent missionaries of war would seem a good fit for him, even if the writing and character observation only fully engage in the later action, as the tone shifts to poignancy and pathos.īased on the Spanish novel Dejarse Llover by Doctors Without Borders veteran Paula Farias, the story aims to capture the spiky solidarity of a disparate band of adventurers from various countries. 'Gangs of Lagos' Director Jáde Osiberu on Making Nigeria's First Gangster Epicīest known for Mondays in the Sun and Princesas, Leon de Aranoa has focused in his films on gritty subjects such as marginalized urban youth, immigration, unemployment and prostitution.

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