From the opening shot, a breathtaking view of a beautiful, but gritty street somewhere in Mexico, you can immediately see why this film might be a worthy candidate for the Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury Prize that it won. And from there the film jumps literally from one beautifully composed scene to the next.

Christopher Zalla’s first film is a film about two young men, teenagers, from the same hopeless place looking for a way to escape. And it’s also a dark and depressing morality tale where good and bad get all mixed up. Juan (Armando Hernandez), running from some bad business ducks into a tractor trailer in a parking lot to escape. Next thing he knows, he’s heading to New York City and he’s chummed up with Pedro (Jorge Adrian Espinola) who plans to meet the father he never knew.

Pedro wakes up hours later in the empty cab, being shooed out by the driver and with all of his belongings gone. We see that Juan has stolen Pedro’s identity and “reunites” with his father Diego (Jesus Ochoa) is rightly, as it turns out, skeptical of this boy who claims to be his son. In the meantime, Pedro stumbles upon Madga (Paola Mondoza), a drug addict who, after scamming him several times, eventually befriends him, taking him to sleep in the abandoned building she calls home.

The film is all about watching these parallel events unfold and knowing that these sto-ries will eventually intersect. There is never any doubt that Juan and Pedro will meet again, yet it is never clear exactly what the circumstances of that reunion will be. We also know that Diego, who has been living what looks to be a joyless life will drop his guard and peel back the layers to expose some of what he has buried.

It’s a beautiful and sad story told skillfully and shot in an exquisite semi documentary style and entirely handheld by Director of Photography, Igor Martinovic. Zalla wanted to make a film about New York City after September 11, a love letter of sorts. He had been interested in making a story about Mexican immigrants who work mostly behind the scenes in the kitchens of restaurants all over the city. And he wanted to break the rules, somehow tell a story but infuse it with a kind of reality that is apart from most conventional Hollywood film. And the reason the film succeeds because it is both narratively complex: a tale of shifting morality and because it is visually arresting in a way that only emphasizes the bleakness of the way these individuals have chosen or been forced to live. It’s not fun, but it is worth seeing.

opens May 23 in Los Angeles.

Written and directed by Christopher Zalla; Director of Photography, Igor Martinovic; edited by Aaron Yanes; music composed by Maria E. Nelson; produced by Benjamin Odell and Per Melita. Released by IFC Films. Running time: 111 minutes.

With: Armando Hernandez (Juan), Jorge Adrian Espindola (Pedro), Jesus Ochoa (Di-ego), Paola Mendoza (Madga), Eugenio Derbez (Anibal), Israel Hernandez (Ricardo) and Leonardo Anzure (Simon.)