Mad Bills to Pay (or Destiny, dile que no soy malo)
An unplanned pregnancy causes major rifts and in Joel Alfonso Vargas’s feature debut, which looks to the side of New York—and the New Yorkers—rarely put on-screen to carve a story of quotidian tension.
Q&A with Joel Alfonso Vargas on April 4 at 6:00pm (FLC) and April 5 at 8:30pm (MoMA)
Rico is going to be a father. The problem: he’s only 19, barely has a job, is astonishingly immature, and is barely concerned with Destiny, the girl he got pregnant. When Destiny moves in with Rico, his no-nonsense mother, and a sister enjoying this upheaval way too much, the young man finds these new responsibilities are far more than he bargained for. In his feature debut, Joel Alfonso Vargas looks to the side of New York—and the New Yorkers—in which cinema has distressingly little interest to carve a thriller of quotidian tension. Extended, electrifying dialogue sequences allow Vargas to sketch harsh dynamics, every fight and passive-aggressive gesture tightening the screws on Rico and his bad choices. It’s hard to take your eyes off the slow-motion wreckage of Mad Bills to Pay (or Destiny, dile que no soy malo), a work that veers from pathos to agitation and back again.
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