Mexican beauty Camilla Lopez (Salma Hayek) hopes to rise above her station by marrying a wealthy American. That is complicated by meeting Arturo Bandini (Colin Farrell), a first-generation I... Read allMexican beauty Camilla Lopez (Salma Hayek) hopes to rise above her station by marrying a wealthy American. That is complicated by meeting Arturo Bandini (Colin Farrell), a first-generation Italian hoping to land a writing career and a blue-eyed blonde on his arm.Mexican beauty Camilla Lopez (Salma Hayek) hopes to rise above her station by marrying a wealthy American. That is complicated by meeting Arturo Bandini (Colin Farrell), a first-generation Italian hoping to land a writing career and a blue-eyed blonde on his arm.
- Awards
- 1 nomination
- Filipino Houseboy
- (as Dion Basco)
- Japanese Vegetable Man
- (as Yoshimura Yasuhiro)
- Worker
- (uncredited)
- Director
- Writers
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaWriter/director Robert Towne finished the script in the early 1990s but couldn't find financial backing. Even with Johnny Depp interested in the project, the script bounced around from studio to studio.
- Quotes
[last lines]
Arturo Bandini: When I was a kid, back in Colorado, it was Smith, Parker and Jones who hurt me with their hideous names. Who called me wop and dago and greaser, and their children hurt me. Just as I hurt you. They hurt me so much, I could never become one of them. Drove me to books, drove me within myself. Drove me to run away from that town in Colorado, into your home and into your life. And sometimes, when I see their faces out here, the same faces, the same sad, hard mouths from my hometown. I'm glad they're here fulfilling the emptiness of their lives and dying in the sun. And they hate me, and my father and my father's father. But they are old and I am young and full of hope. And love for my country and my times.
[breaking down]
Arturo Bandini: And Camilla, when I said "greaser" to you, it was not my heart that spoke, but the quivering of an old wound. And I am ashamed of the terrible thing I have done.
- Crazy creditsOpening credits are shown on the pages of the book Ask the Dust, as someone flips through the first few pages.
- ConnectionsFeatures Dames (1934)
This is 1935 LA, land of love and art, with a whole bunch of racism thrown in between the abstractions. Arturo's being Italian throws a certain doubt on whether he could eventually marry this Mexican Camilla. Ask the Dust subtly explores a melting pot of racism, of course including the ever present persecution of the Jews. In fact, no one in the film has found a mate or a home yet anyway, so loneliness and disenfranchisement are always there.
Cinematographer Caleb Deschanel's shots are each a marvel of painterly cinema, just the right brownish, noirish lighting and shadows to create a marginal world of dream and destitution where only love could create wealth. And what a love. These two leads are to the camera born, their dark good looks making them as much brother and sister as reluctant lovers. Farrell speaks almost as if he is narrating, which he does as well; his intonations are weighty in sotto voce, uncharacteristic of the more flamboyant characters he is used to playing. Hyeck has lusty dignity with a spicy stubbornness that makes you believe she is worthy of marrying this gringo and living happily ever after.
But that ending is the clichéd part of the story, as if all stories about writers must end with a tragedy. Towne, however, tempers the darkness with hope, an aspiration in abundant supply in lala land, but the compromised kind reminding us at the end of his towering Chinatown that it's out of our hands.
- JohnDeSando
- Mar 16, 2006
- Permalink
- How long is Ask the Dust?Powered by Alexa
Details
- Release date
- Countries of origin
- Official sites
- Languages
- Also known as
- Vượt Lên Nghịch Cảnh
- Filming locations
- Production companies
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Gross US & Canada
- $743,847
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $68,779
- Mar 12, 2006
- Gross worldwide
- $2,460,057
- Runtime1 hour 57 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.85 : 1
Contribute to this page
![Salma Hayek and Colin Farrell in Ask the Dust (2006)](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZDc0ZWFmYjAtMTc2ZS00MzdlLThkZjAtM2I5ZGZlZjYzZDRlXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMTMxMTY0OTQ@._V1_QL75_UX90_CR0,1,90,133_.jpg)