Bruce Lee and the Outlaw

I came across this documentary on television and I am very content that I decided to watch it that particular evening it aired on Dutch TV.

I was intrigued from minute one until the very last minute. The director of this movie, Joost shows us a world we hardly know it exists especially because most of it is filmed underground so we literally don't know about its existence.

I love the way how it is filmed and particularly that the director nowwhere in this movie doesn't give the audience room to form his or her own opinion while it could be very easy for the director to judge but he does not.

Make sure you will watch this and you will not be disappointed

At the end of the day I am sure you will realize that the problems you most likely are dealing with could be way worse as you see how much worse it really could be.

I started out thinking that this was going to be a kind of human interest story in a similar vein to Dark Days, the documentary about the homeless who used to inhabit disused subway systems in New York. What 'Bruce Lee and the Outlaw' quickly became was a far more devastating film about a boy's fight for belonging and, ultimately, survival. There is warmth and humanity but there are also the ubiquitous bags of Aurolac that all of the street children constantly huff at.

I am sure there is a fine line between observation and exploitation and I'm not sure Joost Vandebrug hasn't crossed it in this documentary about Romanian street kids and of one in particular, Nicu, and his relationship with 'Bruce Lee', the so-called king of the tunnels where many of these street children live. It's certainly brilliantly made. Vandebrug shoots so up close and personal you can practically smell what it's like down there, (and he's on first-name terms with his subjects who trust him unconditionally), and he filmed it over a period of years with Nicu, (the outlaw of the title), narrating or at least keeping us up to date with what we're seeing. He then edited the picture so that Nicu's story emerges and yet I kept feeling it was done so as to draw our attention as to just how good a film-maker Vandeburg is and not specifically to the terrible conditions in which these people live. In the end, even the 'carers' don't quite come off as the decent human beings I am sure they are. Deeply depressing.

As I always write, i seldom write here, but this documentary is highly recommended. It's about a street kid in Romania who becomes friends with the local "Bruce Lee" , and about how hard life is for the poor people there.