El Sicario, Room 164

A man sits in a hotel room. His face is covered by a black shroud; he has a notepad and draws diagrams as he talks. He worked for years as a hitman for the cartels in Ciudad Juárez and has killed hundreds of people. He explains, in order, how they took people, how they questioned them, where the police fit into it, and who took orders from whom. For eighty minutes the camera never leaves that room. Gianfranco Rosi's documentary came out of an article by the journalist Charles Bowden, who had been writing about the same territory for years. The violence is never shown, only described, and that makes it heavier. It screened at Venice.