Woodpeckers is a small-scale film telling a conventional story in a contained and straightforward manner. The real novelty of the film is the setting—multiple prisons in the Dominican Republic. Both of these are unusual for the cinema: there are few productions entirely inside of prisons and even fewer that are made in the Dominican Republic. And this is a truly Dominican production, utilizing a cast and crew consisting almost entirely of island natives. This novelty is necessary, because Woodpeckers is otherwise a superficial genre exercise.
Woodpeckers involves a love triangle. Julián (Jean Jean) is the protagonist, and his fellow inmate, Manaury (Ramón Emilio Candelario), commissions him with a crucial task: climb up in the barred windows of their cell block to use elaborate hand signals to communicate with Manaury’s girlfriend, Yanelly (Judith Rodríguez Pérez). Yanelly is also incarcerated, at the adjoining women’s facility. Manaury is no longer allowed to be in the window after getting caught holding a knife on a man he accused of talking/signaling to Yanelly. Even though he is aware of Manaury’s violently jealous tendencies, Julián finds himself increasingly charmed by his female conversation partner and ever more tempted to pursue her affections. While Julián is “woodpecking” (so called because the men mounting the windows look like woodpeckers clinging to tree trunks), Manaury is able to monitor him and what he is saying, but he cannot see Yanelly, who is always initiating flirtations with Julián.
The film turns on Yanelly. Woodpeckers probably fails the Bechdel test, but not because it reduces the social agency of its female characters. If the conversations between the male inmates were submitted to examination, they, too, would lack the sort of depth required to be Bechdel-certified. None of the characters here are too profound. Yanelly drives the love triangle, rather than her male pursuers. She clearly signals (pardon the pun) to Julián that she is more interested in him than in Manaury, so that when Manaury is finally diverted from his surveillance of Julián gestures by a crisis in the kitchens (where he works) Julián is able to seize the opportunity to speak freely with Yanelly.
From here, the plot takes some labyrinthine maneuvers to connect the dots between several dramatic set pieces that steadily raise the tension. Yanelly and Julián work desperately to have a real relationship, in spite of the confines of prison and the revanchist desires of the relentless Manaury. Woodpeckers works diligently to push them ever more together until the climactic moments see all three characters in the same enclosed space at the same time, creating one final closing scene to resolve the conflicts between them.
Woodpeckers is shallow, both in terms of story and purpose, but it is not without merit. The establishing shots show the geography of the prison, including its baseball field, basketball court, fitness facilities and food services, which reveal much about Dominican society and culture. The minimalist, hands-off approach of the guards towards the inmates is a stark contrast to the U.S. prison system; the Dominican system is characterized by prisoner self-regulation. The film is also fast-paced and capably stages an exciting prison riot scene, so it remains entertaining enough to hold viewers’ attention.
What is lacking is any kind of social message. This is far from “Orange is the New Black” and its justice-centered narrative. The prisoners here are not remotely complex, believable human beings with overlapping commitments and identities. They are not given the space to show the complicated ways in which they negotiate their lives. They are instead reduced to biological function: they eat, they exercise, they sleep and they yearn for companionship. They are pawns in a genre exercise.
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