All the Fires (2023)

This starts off quite strongly as we meet the young “Bruno” (Sebastian Rojano) who has a penchant for setting things alight. We are not talking grand conflagrations here, but a few dozen matches inside the box can make for quite a distressing sight for his mother when he’s playing in his room! His home life is a bit complicated as his father has recently died and his mum has a new lover, so he decides that he is going to travel to the city to meet a girl he met on the internet. The thing is, “Dani” (Natalia Quiroz) has not been entirely honest with him about her agenda and that’s just further exacerbated by “Ian” (Ari Lopez) who is the gay best pal of “Bruno” and with whom he has had the occasional dalliance. He’s confused, “Dani” is confused and his mother is concerned that her son is in danger of going off what rails he was ever on. With the story now well poised, it unfortunately rather loses it’s way as the characters struggle to focus on what’s important to them, personally, or to us watching. There’s too much pointless dialogue, implausible decision making and padding and though both Rojano and Quiroz deliver their roles with a degree of poignancy the underlying thrust of the drama becomes a little too tepid. I did like that it doesn’t take a rose-tinted approach to growing up, and that it illustrates quite well the fluidity of sexuality and the pressures to conform from both within and without, but again there is just too little substantial to activate the characters and make them relatable. It’s a good looking production but a little too soporifically scored and that rather sums up a disappointingly flat coming-of-age story that struggles to stand out from the crowd.