• Warning: Spoilers
    Burnt Money is a love story, alone in its conquest for equality in the Latin American setting of 1965. At the center are two men, Angel and Nene, characters sharing an extraordinary bond of love, implicit in two ways: one, in that their sexual identity is repressed, and two, that the viewer never witnesses sex in its explicit form between the two. The two struggle to understand just where they fit: Nene, taking in his sexual company a lonely prostitute, and Angel, grappling with Nene's apparent refusal of him by shooting up heroin, nearly dying as a result of his amorous devotion. In a nod to Hollywood cinema, Marcelo Piñeyro focuses on the action just as much as he focuses on the relationship of two men, who call themselves Los Mellizos, or the twins. Like its name implies, Burnt Money appears to signify loss, or losing the value of something or someone. Marcelo Piñeyro suppresses the explicit relationship and the erotic routine from the viewer's eyes. It's almost as if he himself wants to break away from the tradition of thinking that gay love is always overtly evident. Scene after scene, the incredible excruciation of being in love is honorably, even horrifically evident, such as in the scene where Nene tenderly takes to the bullet in his lover, Angel's side; whose agonized screams are shrill as well as painful. Burnt Money is a movie that society should be interested in, because it shows how first impressions are almost always incorrect. By the end of the movie, the audience realizes for itself how living in a materialistic culture affects their understanding of the film. This movie is not for the viewer with a preconceived or pessimistic notion of homosexuality, or one who is easily turned away from overt sexuality, as it appears elsewhere in the film. It's inconceivable to think of a love surviving amidst chaos, yet explicitly evident by the film's conclusion are two characters gleefully and explicitly demonstrating their devotion; a scene where the two burn the money that they stole, and that which their pursuers are after.