How do young men deal with the ground beneath their feet opening up – with their world changing? Those are the well-defined and deeply felt stakes in Sundance’s Mad Bills to Pay: (or Destiny, dile que no soy malo). It’s an intimate coming-of-age film that follows Rico (Juan Collado), a 19-year-old who’s in over his head when his pregnant 16-year-old girlfriend, Destiny (Destiny Checo), comes to stay with his mom and sister over the summer. Through the film’s aesthetics, performances, and focus on Rico’s experience growing up, writer/director Joel Alfonso Vargas examines toxic machismo as a product of his main character’s circumstances.
Watching Mad Bills to Pay feels like looking at someone’s old family albums. The frames have a rounded edge, like what you might find in a scrapbook or photo album that’s been sitting on your grandma’s shelf. Which imparts an intimacy that immediately draws the audience into Rico’s world and everyday life. The camera keeps its distance, though, adding to the film’s photographic quality, thanks to the blocking and framing.
It’s an intriguing contrast that lets the viewer interpret what we see on screen. Through these beautiful frames, we watch Rico stumble through choice after choice and get into nasty arguments with Destiny, his mom, and sister. But there’s no immediate judgment – we are just with Rico and his family.
We’re never given a closeup, a zoom on anyone’s face, no road map through the interpersonal connections we’re watching unfold on screen. It allows us to be a witness to the systemic obstacles faced by Rico as he tries to grow up before his baby arrives.
One particularly stressful moment in the film comes after Rico and Destiny have been at the beach selling “nutties” (homemade cocktails). The couple gets into an argument after Rico flirts with a potential customer on the beach. After arguing for a while at the bus stop, they miss the last bus home and have to take the subway. When Rico jumps an entrance gate to let Destiny in, he’s immediately apprehended by police. The frame stays in place as we’re confronted with the violent apprehension. It’s nerve-wracking, a reminder of how unsettlingly easy it is to get caught up in the carceral system.
Collado’s performance as Rico manifests his pain through destructive arguments, bad decisions, and a devastating desire to do better. There always seems to be a slight sadness underneath the swagger and nonchalance Rico broadcasts to the world. It’s even baked into the title: “Destiny, dile que no soy malo,” or “Destiny, tell them I’m not bad.”
During one argument over getting his child vaccinated, Collado hides Rico’s fear behind a hotheaded exterior. The women he’s surrounded by challenge his ideas and take him to task, and you can see his frustration and confusion boil over. And when there’s a pause or someone lands a particularly devastating blow, his face drops slightly and something softer breaks through the cracks.
He’s an immature kid who doesn’t even realize the ways he benefits from the sexism in his household. “So he can go sling his dick around, get a girl pregnant, and I can’t even go to the movies?” his younger sister asks their mom at one point. For Rico, these concerns are incidental to his life, but won’t be for long. Collado’s performance, which bounces from wounded to defiant to sullen, is adept at capturing Rico as a teenager at a crossroads – how will he move through this world when he becomes a father? How can he?
Mad Bills to Pay is unlike many coming-of-age stories thanks to its specifics. It deftly explores how toxic masculinity is a complicated thing, informed as much by someone’s environment and circumstances as their own beliefs. It’s an approach that doesn’t shirk the issue but offers some room for grace and nuance by acknowledging the circumstances that can help fuel it.
