La Sierra DVD Review: The Real City of God

La Sierra opens with a somber statistic: in the past decade, over 35,000 people have been killed in Colombia's bloody civil conflict. The first image on screen is a fly-covered human corpse sprawled in a ravine, a gruesome victim of the ongoing violence. Right from the start, we're thrust into the midst of a brutal urban war zone, immediately informing us that we're most definitely not in Kansas anymore.

The documentary focuses on the effects of the ceaseless violence on the residents of the hillside community of La Sierra, a barrio located on the outskirts of the metropolitan city of Medellín in Colombia. Although Colombia is known as the cocaine capital of the world, and La Sierra's young residents make no attempt to hide their frequent use of the local product, the armed conflict is portrayed as strictly a turf war, not a grab for control of the lucrative drug trade. It's puzzling at first why anyone would bother fighting over control of the dilapidated and impoverished barrio, until the filmmakers turn the focus to the personal stories of three of its residents.

Angél is a 19-year-old footsoldier in the local gang protecting La Sierra, a victim of a homemade grenade that took his hand. Cielo is a widow and mother at the age of 17 struggling with leading a virtuous and poor life while trying to avoid the lure of easy money in the red light district. Edisón is the 22-year-old leader of the paramilitary gang, a veteran of the conflict and a father of six (by six different girls). Through their willingness to share their experiences, we're granted an intimate and mesmerizing glimpse of their horrific lives.

Shockingly, the young adults have been surrounded by violence for so long that they're largely desensitized and nonchalant about its implications. They realize they can be killed at any time, but with the time they have they're content to live their lives to the fullest. This is particularly evident in their sexual histories, as they all have children well before they exit their teens.