If you know the gaming style ‘first-person shooter,’ this is how A Wolfpack Called Ernesto is filmed. This ‘first-person’ perspective is an unusual term once you’ve added shooter because, in the modern era, it somehow normalises violence whatever age you are, while putting you as the driving force of whatever chaos you produce.

The games are easy to play, and it’s straightforward to forget the reality of your actions with a console controller. While I don’t believe video games and films cause the problems focused on in this documentary, they can be simple enough to blame if you’re personally involved in effectively creating outcomes, and that’s surely the purposeful choice here from director Everardo González.

To summarise, A Wolfpack Called Ernesto is a set of non-fiction stories taking real-life tales told in voice-over in Mexico City. We follow mainly young men sat on the backs of trucks, to basketball courts, through customs with drugs and beyond. They’re essentially groomed by Mexican drug lords to do their work for them. It’s all filmed via the backs of their heads, using a scorpion tail harness and stabiliser, via iPhone – and we’re immersed into that world via visuals and voice-over.

We’re deep in the action of the moment, listening to thoughts from their individual stories and given insight over what they’ve done in their youthful criminal careers. The ‘Ernesto’ relates to the collective, and these teenagers are living a life of drug running, gun buying (with both the US and Mexican Army mentioned) and anything else they’re asked – or trained/conditioned – to do.

Even though the chronicles revealed do indicate a certain level of fear, the opportunity to change your life is given reason, even if in a normal scenario it’s far from rational. It’s obvious that drunkenness rules the moment out in the wild, and the fuel of alcohol also has a big part to play in life-changing moments. Alongside that, we witness a thought-provoking juxtaposition of ‘why worry’ about consequence when what you have now is all you’ve got in life, but then the moral and ethical guilt hits them after the adrenaline has died down, let alone the brutal truth they’ve killed another human with the gun from their own hand.  

With a deep electronic score, there’s an odd Lynchian vibe from time to time here, with further dark edges. Seriousness in this business is vital. Sure, the adults telling you what to do will look after you – but it’s because they know you’ve not got anyone else in your life. And while that pull of quick money and the dream of a fast car is too good to resist – will any of them even get that chance to progress? And this is the important reminder that the people we’re listening to may not even be in this world for very long, as these circumstances leave one person dead every 41 minutes.

While A Wolfpack Called Ernesto is somewhat of a constructed experience as a documentary, it’s an insight like you’ve never seen before, and director Everardo González offers us distinctive, authentic film that’s immersive in an inventive way, and uncomfortable for the brutal reality learned.

A Wolfpack Called Ernesto opens in select UK cinemas from 23 February from Sovereign Films