Drug war in Mexico, told through the eyes of a child, awarded at Sundance “Sujo” tells a moving and unembellished story about the scars left by the Mexican drug war: Four-year-old Sujo narrowly escapes death after his father, who works as a hitman for a cartel, is murdered. Rescued by his aunt, the boy begins a new, uncertain existence characterized by loss, grief and violence. What at first sounds like another Mexican drug thriller turns out to be a sensitive coming-of-age portrait in a world that makes a normal childhood impossible. While most films about the drug wars in Mexico take the perspective of innocent victims or drug lords, directors Astrid Rondero and Fernanda Valadez go one step further and tell the story of the life of an orphan who comes from the world of the perpetrators. With an elegantly constructed screenplay that depicts Sujo's subsequent life from different perspectives, the film examines the question of whether it is possible to escape his past. The film develops a far-sighted political dimension without relying solely on documentary means. “Sujo” is first and foremost an engaging, intelligent and at times mythically charged cinema that always believes in humanity, even in places where it seems to be absent. The film won the World Cinema Dramatic Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival.