Crónicas

It's great seeing John Leguizamo playing a relatively "straight" character, by which I mean not a comic character and not a drug dealer or latin "homie."

Here, Leguizamo plays a TV journalist traveling with his female producer and male camera man who is sent to cover the latest funeral in a series of sexual murders of small children.

While there, a traveling salesman returning from his business route accidentally hits a boy who ran out in front of his vehicle. Unfortunately, this boy is the twin of the latest murder victim and the crowd turns on him.

He is saved from being lynched and burned alive by Leguizamo's intervention, although he is also sent to jail. The man offers to trade information he has about "The Monster" (as the murderer is called) if Leguizamo will use his influence to get him out of jail.

The rest of the movie is about Leguizamo getting information out of the prisoner and trying to determine whether the prisoner is faking, actually has valuable information, or might even be the killer himself.

Leguizamo is torn between getting the truth and advancing his career. To complicate matters further, he enters into an affair with his producer who is the wife of a much more powerful anchorman (Alfred Molina) back at their network.

The supporting cast is extraordinarily good, especially Leonor Watling as his producer.

Once again we see that a good story and a great cast can make a great movie on a budget that in a typical Hollywood production would probably hardly cover the catering bill.