Goodbye Solo, 2008 (Grade A-)

Director: Ramin Bahrani
Awards? Independent Spirit Best Make Lead nominee -- well deserved
Starring: Souleymane Sy Sayane; Red West; Diana Franco Galindo; Lane Williams; Mamadou Lam; Carmen Leyfa; Viktor Hernandez; Nayanj Reyes; Virgilio Tix

plot outline: cab driver Solo (Souleman Sy Sayane) lives with his Mexican girlfriend and her bright young daughter and they are about to have a child together.  She wants him to be steady in his work to support his family and he dreams of being an airline attendant and is studying hard to fulfill his dream. One night he picks up Walter who offers Solo $1000 to drive him to a famous mountain overlook in a date in the near future.  Solo is an accommodating and caring man--he knows there is something fishy about the request and tries to befriend Walter and to dissuade him from moving forward in what appears to be a plan for suicide.

sez says: Solo is one of the most appealing characters I've meet in the movies for a long while.  I recommend him to you. This is not a fast paced Hollywood mainstream movie-- rather it is a nicely paced mystery of sorts, populated with people who do not tell all. It is about real people--not superheros--and the world as it is lived--and not just the presentation of a fantasy