There are certain places in this world that draw people to them. The ones to come to immediately to mind in the U.S. are Los Angeles, California, or New York City, New York, as cornerstones of music, theater, and entertainment production. But these aren’t the only places in the world that generate a pull, that attract people to come from all over to find inspiration. One such place is a single road in Capotillo within the Dominican Republic, 42^nd Street, a place where dancers, artists, and musicians congregate en masse, finding inspiration in the energy from the nightly parties. Filmmaker José María Cabral (Tiguere) turns his camera toward the location, its leaders, and the people who reside within it in his documentary 42^nd Street (La 42), which recently premiered worldwide during SXSW 2025’s 24 Beats Per Second section and held its Florida premiere during the 2025 Miami Film Festival. Utilizing a mixed approach of narrative and documentary styles, Cabral provides an insightful look into a community that’s inspired the likes of artists like Bad Bunny and Akon.

A scene in José María Cabral’s documentary 42ND STREET. Photo courtesy of Miami Film Festival.

Co-written by Cabral and Miguel Yarul (Captain Avispa), 42^nd Street uses a somewhat mixed media approach to telling the story of the 600-meter space and its influence across the globe. The first element is the use of an unseen narrator who identifies themselves as Zuami (voiced by Ramón Emilio Candelario) who, after a brief explanation of their experience growing up in Capotillo, tells us that they died some time ago. This immediately provides a narrative framework that makes what follows seem hyperreal, despite being a documentary. This voice is our guide into, through, and out of the film, sometimes filling in gaps where the individuals we meet can’t do so naturally. It’s a smart move by Cabral in the sense that there’s a lot about 42^nd Street people need to understand beyond the language spoken or the cultural itself, stuff like slang and other 42^nd Street-specific nomenclature that require pauses for audiences to absorb. In these moments, in addition to the narration, the audience is given definition cards artistically designed to be eye-catching while providing both the term and definition being discussed. This could be a descriptor of dembow, a musical style prominent within the community; the gillet dance, wherein someone dances while playing with a razor blade on their tongue; and the grimaces dance, which is to dance to dembow while making faces like you’re heavily drugged. These inserts and the narrator help give the documentary shape in ways that just filming the individuals and typical talking head interviews cannot. These elements and a few other visual sequences blend the fiction and the real so that it’s often easy to forget that one is watching a documentary.

Demetal in José María Cabral’s documentary 42ND STREET. Photo Credit: Manuela Hidalgo. Photo courtesy of SXSW.

The second element Cabral utilizes is the presentation of the de facto 42^nd Street leader Demetal, best friend to Zuami and operator of ZM Music, in opposition to local police leader Officer Reyes. An oversimplification of Demetal would be to describe him as a reformed criminal who utilizes his influence to create a better environment for his own children and others in the neighborhood. This means giving out supplies to local schoolkids who form a long line to be handed materials, offering space to artists to create (like outsider Ricardo who arrives from London to paint), using his online platform to advertise other musicians, and generally finding ways to support those seeking to enrich their lives and the lives of others within Capotillo through song, dance, and artistic expression. At one point, a member of Demetal’s crew helps show off a set of rules painted on a wall that their crew lives by, each line detailing the various ways in which they seek to lift up everyone through a guiding principle of respect. Conversely, Reyes is depicted as less of a peacekeeper and more of an authoritarian, preferring that the whole of 42^nd Street be shutdown due to gang activity (that we don’t see) and the sale of drugs (which we do see, including with one of Demetal’s people) which she recognizes as a greater harm to the community at large than anything that could come from it. This results in various raids or event interruptions, which, from the perspective of the film, presents Reyes in a poor light, especially with Zuami’s accusations of local police planting evidence in order to reach convictions. In all the interactions we see, Demetal is patient, kind, and supportive, making for a compelling and engaging watch as we witness this community leader navigate a variety of tense situations with gentleness. There are, of course, others within the sphere of influence of Demetal whom we follow — Natasha Dancer, who oversees a group of street dancers responsible for drawing crowds (sometimes to businesses on purpose); Maco Boba, who performs various jobs for Demetal and struggles with addictions that prevent him from raising his own profile; and Ricardo, an artist from London draw to 42^nd Street after stumbling across dembow.

Natasha Dancer in José María Cabral’s documentary 42ND STREET. Photo courtesy of Miami Film Festival.

Interestingly, the biggest issue that 42^nd Street possesses is born from the merging of narrative and documentary languages. A documentary implies that what’s captured, though specific to the perspective of the director, is accurate. That what we see is what occurs, filtering as little as possible in order to capture the truth. A narrative, however, utilizes a variety of mechanisms and tools in order to tell a story, truth being the thing it wants to evoke even when presenting falsehoods. So, while one can fault Cabral a tiny bit for showing off someone having makeup applied to look like a zombie without explaining why, revealing the reason during a Demetal-produced music video with the credits, creating an unnecessary mystery in the middle of the documentary, a larger issue is born from the obvious manipulation of Zuami throughout the film. We’re told through the narration at the start that Zuami was killed by police in his home, but no other information is shared to express *why* it happens. Context is entirely key in a story like this, especially when the police are being actively positioned as intrusive and manipulative and Demetal as a local hero. Couple this with the fact that the credits say that Officer Reyes is played by Ines Fermin and doubts form as to whether or not what we’ve seen is authentic. It’s one thing for members of the art community to have a nom de plume (Demetal is Alexander Toledo and Ricardo La Música is Jose Ricardo Pozo), but it’s another to have crafted an entire section of the documentary out of whole cloth in order to present a version of police presence. Given what we see in the film, it’s quite possible that any footage of the police was forbidden and, therefore, required hiring actors to fill those roles, but it does call into question the authenticity of what we observe.

A scene from José María Cabral’s documentary 42ND STREET. Photo courtesy of SXSW.

There’s no question that 42^nd Street is a real place with massive influence. Do enough searches online and you’ll find evidence for this, which is why it makes sense that someone would want to document the people who live within it. The issue with 42^nd Street is that no matter how compelling the journey we observe, there’s so much doubt regarding its authenticity that the initial high one might feel in the artistic talent on display leaves a sour taste. Looking through the available press materials, there’s no mention of any of narrative tools and why, so it’s uncertain right now if this was a choice forced upon Cabral to keep the filming of the documentary safe for the crew or was one selected in order to make the documentary more palatable to audiences. Shitty cops exist everywhere, so it’s easy to believe in Officer Reyes as someone using overreach to solve a problem where communication could do so with less disruption to the community, but, if there’s no Officer Reyes, then what message is Cabral sending about the inhabitants of 42^nd Street and why? To that end, the documentary may be well made, engaging, and, often, raw, but, to borrow from Demetal’s philosophy, what does any of it matter if it’s not authentic?

World premiere during SXSW 2025.
Florida premiere during Miami Film Festival 2025.

Final Score: 3 out of 5.

Categories: In Theaters, Reviews

Tags: 42nd Street, art, Castilian, Demetal, documentary, Dominican Republic, drama, foreign film, José María Cabral, Maco Boba, Miguel Yarul, Music, Natasha Dancer, Ricardo La Música, Spanish, Tabula Rasa