2023 SLAMDANCE FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW!
Living in Cisco, Utah, a ghost town, is a young woman, Eileen Muza. She lives off the grid for the most part, doesn’t interact with too many others, and tends to be self-sufficient when it comes to handling the sometimes troublesome weather and interesting passers-by. Cisco Kid is Eileen’s story–and it shows her in her best moments and in her worst. This documentary doesn’t hold back, and it looks to bring to life all that Eileen has made for herself.
There just isn’t enough content to keep viewers engaged for more than an hour. Cisco Kid desperately needs to be a short film that pulls viewers in, utilizes more concise one-on-one interviews with Eileen (rather than her explaining everything in real time), and doesn’t pretend that Cisco, Utah is enough to drive an entire feature-length film. If you can’t tell, I’m slightly frustrated at the fact that Cisco Kid is far too long, and worse than that, it believes it’s more than it actually is. This falls on the shoulders of Director Emily Kaye Allen, a first-time director. I can certainly understand that you’re passionate about your first project, and that you want to do whatever you can to make a name for yourself and bring your subject matter to life. However, what’s more important than bringing this story to life is knowing your and your subject’s limits. I’m not sure that Allen has figured this out just yet. She has the potential to get there–but Cisco Kid isn’t a good representation of what she might have to offer.
Cisco Kid plays with the idea of sexuality and nudity as a way to keep viewers engaged. There’s always this idea in the back of viewers' minds that there might be some slip up, and the erotic curiosity of man is just enough to keep some viewers around until the end. I don’t want to call this a ploy or a ruse used to string viewers along, but when it’s clear that there isn’t quite enough content to keep viewers engaged for the duration of the film, it’s hard to believe that this idea never entered Allen’s mind. To be fair, this isn’t the worst idea if it is the case–but I hoped for something else to play a more prominent role in enticing viewers throughout the course of Cisco Kid.
This film forces viewers to think about their own lives, and I think that’s the most compelling aspect of the entire thing. Viewers are able to develop this juxtapositional image in their minds of Cisco and where they live. While I’m sure there are a number of viewers who aren’t thrilled with their living situation, I think that Cisco Kid puts what they have in perspective. It does more than just to say that viewers have an easier life than Eileen–it also helps to express that no matter where you are (physically) in life, there is a way to move forward.
I struggled with some of the tones strewn throughout Cisco Kid, because I believe that it paints Eileen in a poor light. I don’t, even in the slightest, think that this was the intention. However, with a film that lasted more than an hour, one that had enough content for maybe a thirty-minute short, some of the filler that exists throughout (her talking about her gun, close ups of the wildlife in a way that paints the world around Eileen as boring, etc.) simply drags Eileen and Cisco Kid down. A much more condensed version of Cisco Kid makes a lot more sense, and had Allen explored Eileen in a more concise way, I believe the film would have been more successful and entertaining.
Directed by Emily Kaye Allen.
Starring Eileen Muza, Joe Bell, Sallie Hodges, Shari Zollenberger, David Robinson, etc.
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐/10
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