I'm No Longer Here

I'm No Longer Here
Film poster

Spanish	Ya no estoy aquí

Directed by	Fernando Frías de la Parra
Written by	Fernando Frías de la Parra
Produced by	Gerardo Gatica Alberto Muffelmann Gerry Kim Fernando Frías de la Parra
Starring	Juan Daniel García Treviño Yahir Alday Angelina Chen
Cinematography	Damian Garcia
Edited by	Yibrán Asuad Fernando Frías de la Parra
Production companies	Panorama Global PPW Films
Distributed by	Netflix
Release dates	21 October 2019 (2019-10-21) (Morelia) 27 February 2020 (2020-02-27) (Mexico) 27 May 2020 (2020-05-27) (Netflix)
Running time	112 minutes
Countries	Mexico United States
Languages	Spanish English Mandarin Chinese

I'm No Longer Here (Spanish: Ya no estoy aquí) is a 2019 Mexican Spanish-language drama film written and directed by Fernando Frías de la Parra, and starring Juan Daniel García Treviño and Angelina Chen.

The script, completed in 2013, was originally published as a short story before being adapted as a full-length feature.^[1] It was released on 27 February 2020 to positive reviews from critics,^[2] before receiving a global Netflix release on 27 May 2020.^[3]^[4]

The film was also screened in several film festivals including the 2020 Tribeca Film Festival and received several awards and nominations in international festivals.^[5] It was selected as the Mexican entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 93rd Academy Awards,^[6] making the shortlist of fifteen films,^[7] but was not nominated.

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Transcription

Plot

The film is presented in a nonlinear narrative, jumping between Ulises's experiences in Mexico and the United States. The following is a linear summary of the plot:

In 2011, in the slums of Monterrey, a 17-year-old teenager named Ulises is the leader of a gang called Los Terkos. They dedicate themselves to hanging out and following the counter-culture of Kolombia: a lifestyle that consists of dancing and listening to "Cumbia rebajada" (a slowed version of Cumbia)^[a]. Los Terkos members dress in bright, baggy clothes and sport homemade, eccentric hairdos. The majority of their time is spent attending dance parties and showing off their stylish colors.

While attempting to retrieve some money from students outside a school so that Los Terkos can buy an MP3 player, Ulises and his gang are confronted by a member of an organized criminal group called Los F^[b] who tries to scare them away. Later, as a different member of Los F is arrested by police, one of the Terkos steals the criminal's hand radio. That night, Los Terkos play a prank on Los F using the radio, only to be easily located by two armed members of Los F who threaten Ulises and his friend Jeremy to quit their relaxed gang lifestyle or be killed.

The next day, Ulises accidentally witnesses the drive-by shooting of members of a fellow gang, Los Pelones^[c], by Los F. One of the survivors, while badly wounded, notices Ulises holding the radio the Terkos stole from Los F earlier and incorrectly assumes that Ulises had set up the shooting. The survivor accuses Ulises of being a traitor and orders him to run away, threatening to kill his family if he does not. Ulises and his family flee the slum, and his mother uses some favors to smuggle Ulises into the United States illegally, demanding that he stay away from criminal activities. As Ulises leaves, one of the Terkos, Chaparra, gives Ulises the MP3 device that Los Terkos had planned to purchase from a bootleg music salesman.

After being smuggled inside a van across the border, Ulises arrives in Queens, and lives with a group of day laborers who he soon gets into conflict with due to his lack of experience with manual labor, not knowing English, and his musical preferences. This leads to a fight with one of his roommates when they turn off the music during a party. After the fight, he leaves and takes a job cleaning the rooftop of a store owned by Mr. Loh, a Chinese man. His grandniece, Lin, is curious about Ulises and befriends him, wanting to learn more about his past way of life. She buys him a dictionary to help him learn English and allows Ulises to live in a run-down shed on the roof.

Ulises tries to earn some easy money by dancing to his Kumbia in a subway station and in the streets, only to be scared away each time by police and homeless people. He attends a party with Lin but leaves alone after getting drunk on beer and feeling homesick. He calls home but his mother rejects the idea of coming back, as Los F would kill him on sight. He goes back to a Latin bar he had gone to with his former roommates to seek advice from a Colombian sex worker he briefly connected with while there. After spending the night in her living room, she tells him that she cannot see him again, either at the bar or at her apartment. Ulises wanders the streets and buys a bottle of paint thinner. He inhales it before cutting his hair while intoxicated.

Ulises is caught sleeping in the streets by the police and is deported back to Mexico after spending some months in prison. He travels back to his slum in Monterrey to find that Los F have taken control of the populace, with most of Los Terkos having joined the criminal organization. After attending the funeral of one of his old Terko friends, Ulises visits Jeremy. He finds that Jeremy has converted to Christianity and spends his days preaching, in rap form, to other boys in the slum. Despite an offer to stay with Jeremy, Ulises decides to live on the streets by himself. He dances one last time to the music on his MP3 device before the battery dies. In the distance, he sees a large group of neighborhood residents running towards the slums to hide from the police after deliberately blocking a major avenue as a distraction, allowing the members of Los F to run away and avoid arrest.

Cast

Juan Daniel García Treviño as Ulises Sampiero
Jonathan Espinoza as Jeremy
Angelina Chen as Lin
Coral Puente as Chaparra
Adríana Arbelaez as Gladys
Leonardo Garxa as Pekesillo
Yahir Alday as Sudadera

Awards and nominations

Year	Award	Category	Result
2019	Cairo International Film Festival	Best Actor – Juan Daniel Garcia Treviño	Won
	Cairo International Film Festival	Golden Pyramid Best Film	Won
	Morelia International Film Festival	Audience Award	Won
	Morelia International Film Festival	Best Feature Film	Won
2020	Göteborg Film Festival	Dragon Award	Nominated
2021	Satellite Awards	Best Foreign Language Film	Nominated
	Goya Awards	Best Iberoamerican Film	Nominated
	Directors Guild of America Awards	First-Time Feature Film	Nominated
	Golden Reel Awards	Best Sound Editing – Foreign Language	Nominated

Notes

^ Kolombia, lo kolombia, los colombias or cholombiano is an urban subculture that emerged in Monterrey, Nuevo León, Mexico. It is characterized by a cholo-inspired outfit with strong Colombian elements, as well as a predilection for lowered cumbia and vallenato.
^ It is heavily implied that Los F is a powerful Mexican drug cartel that has taken over the city of Monterrey, to the point of decimating all other gangs in the city, such as Los Terkos (the gang that the protagonist Ulisses was a member of) and Los Pelones.
^ English: "The Bald Ones"