Un poeta

"I'm a poet," Oscar insists, almost desperately. "You're unemployed," his sister snaps back. Once a promising writer, Oscar peaked (too) early, is now past his prime, estranged from his daughter, and living with his ailing mother. Despite his prickly personality, he sees a shot at redemption when he begins mentoring a gifted teenager from an underprivileged background. But Un poeta, a Colombian tragicomedy, steers clear of easy sentimentality and instead leans into a kind of secondhand embarrasment reminiscent of The Office. Lead actor Ubeimar Ríos has the kind of face made for memes, and 16mm film only highlights the beauty of imperfection. While the film gently mocks the image of the suffering artist - melancholic jazz drifts in and out with ironic flair - director Simón Mesa Soto also takes aim at the pretensions of the art world itself. This slight satire won the Jury Prize in Cannes' Un Certain Regard competition.