The subjects of Pawel Ferdek’s short documentary “Glass Trap” look to be typical hardcore gangsters – shaved heads, flashy sunglasses, and wicked beards abound. However, their pastime, though violent and appalling, is far from the usual gangster activity. They don’t bet on underground boxing matches, dog fights or cock fights, but instead spend their nights fish fighting.
The unnamed protagonist is an unquestioned tough guy. He shaves his own head in the opening of the film, and speeds down the wrong side of the street in his BMW (which he calls a “bimmer”). He does lines of cocaine off the trunk of a car, and beats another man with his fists in a run-down garage.
He has quite the affinity for fish, however. In the opening scene, he taunts a massive red fish with his finger, and talks to it lovingly. Later, he pumps his blood-red betta fish up before its climactic fight.
Ferdek laughed when asked how he found this man. “These guys are my friends,” he said.
Ferdek admitted the film’s events aren’t entirely real – he suggested the fish fight to his friends – and he doesn’t try to hide the criminal nature of the activities documented.
“It’s quite illegal,” he said. “I hope police will not see the film.”
- Drew Orozco
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