In several interview sequences, barrio residents problematize how their community has been stigmatized through language, geography, and selective media representation. None of the Afrodescendent neighbors explicitly references race or the pervasiveness of geographic profiling, but their comments confirm that the mere mention of canal barrios like Curundú and El Chorrillo conjures a suspicious gaze. Aware of this endemic profiling, Marilis, Kenneth’s neighbor, feels compelled to change her place of residence on job applications: “Living in Curundú is like a sin for certain people. So when you go looking for a job . . . Oh, no! I don’t write that I live in Curundú!” Another resident refers to the pejorative and dehumanizing terminology used to
Constructed around a conversation between Kenneth and a neighborhood man, who rallies his fellow curundueños to vote “yes” on the proposal to expand the canal, the film’s climax interweaves the story of the marginal barrio with the elusive discourse of opportunity and progress that frames the waterway. While some neighbors espouse a nationalist view of the Panama Canal as both a panacea for the country’s woes and a source of employment, Kenneth undercuts this narrative by quipping that the Canal should be expanded so there are more tourists to rob. This mischievous scene is ultimately tragicomic; it transitions to a text that informs viewers of Kenneth’s arrest. Ironically, the same crime that first facilitated his photography business—stealing a camera from a tourist—comes back to haunt him, as he is jailed for allegedly repeating this misdemeanor. Detained in jail without evidence or formal charges, Kenneth waits a grueling six months for his case to be reviewed. Unlike in “The World’s Most Dangerous Gang,” law enforcement agencies are not featured as guardians of safety and order, but rather as bastions of ineffective bureaucracy. The uncertainty surrounding Kenneth’s arrest and the failures of Panama’s judicial system, disrupt the
In both cases, these events are revisited from the perspective of neighborhoods whose systematic marginalization is historically tied to the waterway. Both films’ ambivalent uses of the ghetto documentary genre challenge sensationalist views of these communities by intentionally or unintentionally laying bare the act of capturing, framing, and interpreting images of violence and abject poverty. Mixing genres and modes of address, both films suggest that marginality is structural, including its construction through spectacle and selective