Highway Patrolman

Pedro finishes the police academy and is posted to a highway patrol in northern Mexico. He is young, eager and believes in the rules. Small things happen in the first days: drivers he stops hold out money, his colleagues treat it as normal, and the wage does not cover living. He refuses at first. Then he marries, has a child and takes on debt. Over the years he changes step by step. Alex Cox directs. Roberto Sosa plays Pedro. Cox is a British director and the film was made entirely in Mexico in Spanish. Its form is striking: most scenes are shot in a single unbroken take with the camera moving around the character. That choice gives the narrative a documentary texture. The subject is corruption being structural rather than personal. Pedro is not a bad man; the system makes him resemble it step by step, and every step looks reasonable. The daily work of the patrol is given in detail: accident scenes, checks on lorries, the drug traffic and the long waits in the middle of the desert. It was made cheaply and shown narrowly; Cox has named it as his own favourite among his films. Who it is for: viewers who like social drama set in Latin America and formally unusual films. Who it is not for: the pace is slow, the narrative is episodic, and the character's transformation proceeds slowly.