''The Kings of the World'' ( es, Los reyes del mundo, links=no) is a 2022 internationally co-produced

drama Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance: a play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on radio or television.Elam (1980, 98). Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has been ...

road movie A road movie is a film genre in which the main characters leave home on a road trip, typically altering the perspective from their everyday lives. Road movies often depict travel in the hinterlands, with the films exploring the theme of alienatio ...

directed by Laura Mora Ortega. Set in

Medellín Medellín ( or ), officially the Municipality of Medellín ( es, Municipio de Medellín), is the second-largest city in Colombia, after Bogotá, and the capital of the department of Antioquia. It is located in the Aburrá Valley, a central re ...

, the drama is about five teenage friends who live on the streets. As a result, they leave a Colombian city to start over in the countryside. The film premiered in September 2022 at the

70th San Sebastián International Film Festival The 70th San Sebastián International Film Festival took place from 16 to 24 September 2022 in San Sebastián, Gipuzkoa, Spain. The awards were announced on 24 September 2022, with '' The Kings of the World'' winning the Golden Shell. Backgroun ...

where it won the

Golden Shell The Golden Shell ( es, Concha de Oro; eu, Urrezko Maskorra) is the highest prize given to a competing film at the San Sebastián Film Festival. It was introduced in 1957. In 1953 and 1954, the highest prize had been called the Gran Premio. In 19 ...

for Best Picture.

Synopsis

Rá, Culebro, Sere, Winny and Nano live on the streets of Medellín. The five children no longer have any contact with their families. They form a kind of fraternal clan in which they have to make their way in a parallel world without laws. In doing so, they uphold ideals such as friendship and dignity, but also display disobedience and resistance. In a dangerous journey between delirium and nothingness, the group leaves the city and enters the depths of the Colombian interior. There they hope to find a piece of land that Rá inherited from his late grandmother. Like thousands of other Colombians, she was once violently expelled by the

paramilitaries A paramilitary is an organization whose structure, tactics, training, subculture, and (often) function are similar to those of a professional military, but is not part of a country's official or legitimate armed forces. Paramilitary units carr ...

. After her death, Rá received the "promised land" through a government restitution program. The boys make friends that help them advance but also warn them of the dangers of their company. They also meet

sex work Sex work is "the exchange of sexual services, performances, or products for material compensation. It includes activities of direct physical contact between buyers and sellers as well as indirect sexual stimulation". Sex work only refers to volunt ...

ers who provide them with short-term maternity care.

Cast

* Carlos Andrés Castañeda as Rá * Davison Florez as Sere * Brahian Acevedo as Nano * Cristian Campaña as Winny * Cristian David Duque as Culebro

Release

Festivals

''The Kings of the World'' premiered on 21 September 2022 at the

. The work was previously screened to international distributors at the

2022 Toronto International Film Festival The 2022 Toronto International Film Festival, the 47th event in the Toronto International Film Festival series, is scheduled to be held from September 8 to 18, 2022. Festival organizers have indicated that the 2022 festival will be staged primar ...

, along with ten other critically acclaimed films. Other invitations followed in the film festival programs of Zurich (September) and

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

(October).

Theatrical

The film was theatrically released in Colombia on 13 October 2022, with opening attendance figures below expectations (28,117 admissions throughout the first 5 days of its theatrical run).

International

On October 24, 2022,

Netflix Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fil ...

acquires the film for distribution in

the Americas The Americas, which are sometimes collectively called America, are a landmass comprising the totality of North America, North and South America. The Americas make up most of the land in Earth's Western Hemisphere and comprise the New World. ...

(except

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

). It premiered on the platform on January 4, 2023. Bteam Pictures will distribute in theaters in

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

Reception

Critical reception

According to the

review aggregation A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, ''The Kings of the World'' has a 96% approval rating based on 27 reviews from critics, with an average rating of 8.2/10. The site's consensus reads, "Journeying between lyricism and brutal reality, ''The Kings of the World'' is a hopeful trip towards freedom away from the city where it cruelly dead ends". Cristóbal Soage of

Cineuropa The MEDIA sub-programme of Creative Europe or simply Creative Europe MEDIA (formerly The MEDIA Programme of the European Union) is designed to support the European film and audiovisual industries. Budget The goal of programmers is to increase the ...

praised the film as an "extraordinary work" and the director Mora "as one of the greatest talents on the modern Latin American film scene," as well as the young actors of the same name. It is "a hallucinogenic story as cruel and painful as it is fascinating". He also raved about David Gallego's camera work, which captures "the poignant beauty of the Colombian jungle ..in all its splendor." Soage described the scenes between the boys and the sex workers as "particularly moving". "In the end, we feel that we have witnessed an important work, a portrait of a time and place as comprehensive and precise as it is poetic and moving," says the critic. Guy Lodge (''

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

'') saw a "raw, offbeat coming-of-age drama" that transcends the sentimentality that tends to dominate the genre "with a delirious, even surreal energy in its five-story Medellin street children".

Accolades

For ''The Kings of the World'', Laura Mora won the

at the San Sebastián International Film Festival, as well as the Feroz Zinemaldia Prize and the SIGNIS Prize from the World Catholic Association for the communication. It has also been invited to international feature film competitions at the Zurich and Chicago festivals.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Kings of the World, The 2022 films 2022 drama films Colombian drama films Colombian road movies French drama road movies Luxembourgian drama films Mexican drama road movies Norwegian drama films 2020s drama road movies Films shot in Colombia Films set in Colombia Films about friendship 2020s Spanish-language films Spanish-language French films 2020s Colombian films 2020s French films 2020s Mexican films