Broken (orig. Rotas) [2016]

MPAA (UR would be PG-13)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
Official Facebook
Official Dance Company Page

Cine y Tele article*
ABC7Chicago.com story about stage production
ABC.es artículo sobre producción teatral*
ViveLoHoy.com entrevista con Luis Lorente / Paloma Gomez*


Broken (orig. Rotas) [2016] (written and directed by Luis Lorente) is a SPANISH FLAMENCO-BASED film about domestic violence that PREMIERED recently at the 32nd (2016) Chicago Latino Film Festival.

I went to see the premiere -- in attendance being both the director Luis Lorente as well as the two lead ballerinas Paloma Gómez and Raquel Gómez -- in part because this Festival showcases not only dramatic films from Latin America but also film homages to other Latino contributions to the Arts.

In years past, I've seen two wonderful documentaries about the rich musical traditions of Cuba [2012] and Peru [2013] (the first I reviewed, the second though _excellent_ I did not); a surrealist homage to a, well ;-), surrealist artist (Alejandro Colunga) from Mexico [2014]; and a Chilean biopic about poet Pablo Neruda [2015].  This year's [2016] program featured a couple of documentaries about the music of Paraguay [1] [2] as well as a documentary named Gabo: La Magia de lo Real [2015] about the life and work of famed Colombian writer Gabriel García Marquéz.  Ever having to choose, I chose to go with seeing the lovely / fascinating Cuban "indie" film Espejuelos Oscuros [2015], and then the current film (from Spain) which presents its story, in part, in the idiom of Flamenco dance.

The current film is adapted from a stage production with the same name and about the same theme.   Yet as a top quality screen adaptation, the film takes advantage of the possibilities offered offered by film medium as opposed to simply the stage.  Thus the film weaved together three types of presentation:

There are stage-acted vignettes that set-up the the stories of Celia (played / danced by Raquel Gómez and voiced by Amparo Climent) and Consuelo (played / danced by Paloma Gómez and voiced by Luisa Gavaza) two women abused by men in their lives.

There are the danced emotional responses of these two women to the situations that they find themselves in.

Finally, interspersed in the film are testimonies of various women who actually endured the kind of suffering / abuse portrayed in the story.

Further, the film makers took full advantage of the possibilities offered by presenting the story by means of a camera:  Thus Viewers are offered visual (point of view) perspectives on the story as it plays-out that would be simply impossible to offer to Viewers simply seated in a theater watching a stage production. 

North American Readers here with some experience of watching some of the "Met-Live" productions offered by FathomEvents.com would understand some of the benefits (closeup / alternative POVs + interview possibilities) offered to Viewers watching a staged event in this, a screen form.  Further, as opposed to a "Met-Live" video production, the film here is a well crafted, definitive, indeed "canonical" product.  Hence it has also taken advantage of the possibilities of multiple takes / editing.

The lovers of Stage productions will, of course, find some sadness in that -- the Spontaneity _inherently present_ on the Stage has passed through and been largely Removed (except where it has been Approved) by a Censor (er ... "Editor" ;-).  Yet a film print of such a Production becomes that Production's "Final" or "Best / Canonical" product.  And a film offers advantages (some enumerated above) over those possible on Stage.

So this is a very interesting and thought-provoking production about a theme -- domestic violence -- that itself produces much to think about / discuss as well. 

As such it is a truly stellar quality product and I do hope it becomes available on DVD or various streaming platforms (vimeo, iTunes, Netflix, Amazon Instant Video) soon enough.

Excellent job!   


* Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser. 

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Dad (orig. ¡Pa! ¡Por mis hijos lo que sea!) [2015]

MPAA (UR would be PG)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/4 Stars)

IMDb listing
FilmAffinity/es listing*

BluRadio.com radio interview w. director*
Vangardia.cine article about director*

WRadio.com.co review*
Zeleb.com.co review*


Dad (orig. ¡Pa! ¡Por mis hijos lo que sea!) [2015] [IMDb] [FAes]* (written and directed by Harold Trompetero [IMDb] [FAes]*) is a very funny and very sweet FAMILY DRAMEDY from COLOMBIA that played recently at the 32nd (2016) Chicago Latino Film Festival.

Viewers will find it in a similar bittersweet vein as Roberto Begnini's Life is Beautiful (orig. La vita è bella) [1997] and Eugenio Derbez' more recent Instructions Not Included (orig. No se Aceptan Devoluciones) [2013].

The film's about Enrique (played by Júlio César Herrera [IMDb] [FAEs]*) initially some sort of a big-shot manager for some sort of a Colombian bank or enterprise.  At the beginning of the film, he's told by his boss that he's being promoted to lead the enterprise's office in Lima, Peru.  Just a few formalities needed to be completed -- some paper work, a medical exam -- and then he'd be set.

Well, Enrique comes home beaming to his wife Luz (played by Nöelle Shönwald [IMDb] [FAEs]*) and his teenage daughter (played by Grace David [IMDb] [FAEs]*) and slightly younger son (played by Juan Sebastian Parada [IMDb] [FAEs]*) and they're, of course, very excited.  The daughter in particularly with all the certainly of a 14-15 year old exclaims "Dad, and we're going to have to get completely new [iphones, etc] because you know PERU is at the _leading edge_ of the tech world in Latin America" (Nice try daughter, trying to get me to buy you a new iPhone ;-).

All this excitement comes to a screeching halt when the medical test comes back, and the boss tells him, "I'm sorry Enrique, but with a medical test like this we can't send you to Lima." (What does the test say, it's unclear).  Things get even worse when the boss informs him that _unfortunately_ they had already hired someone to replace him, SO ... not only does Enrique NOT get the promotion to Lima, but effectively HE'S LOST HIS JOB.

SO ... Enrique has to go home and tell the family that not only are they not going to Lima but now he's unemployed and ... at minimum his age it's not necessarily gonna be easy to find another job.

Much of the rest of the film is about Enrique coming-up with increasingly desperate ways to bring home some money, AND ALSO the family progressively adapting / chipping-in to try to make the situation better.

Notably the Colombian "valley girl" of a daughter who initially (and mindlessly) looked-down upon the young people her age working at the mall, "rolling her eyes" and so forth when they got something wrong ... now GETS A JOB AT THE SAME MALL (and finds herself putting-up with similar "eye rolling" customers ;-)  BUT SHE DOES THIS HAPPILY FOR THE SAKE OF THE FAMILY ... that is, SHE'S GROWN UP A BIT in the process ;-)

Luz, Enrique's wife becomes a real supportive trooper as well.

Of course, there's a reveal that has to occur, which I'm not going to reveal here.  But I do want to say that THIS WAS A REALLY NICE MOVIE.  Yes, the family was rich (certainly initially) richer than the vast majority of Colombians (or even North Americans) BUT IT WAS ALSO A FAMILY THAT REALLY SUPPORTED EACH OTHER WHEN TIMES GOT TOUGH.

It was just a really nice film and one that reminds Viewers of the place of Family in Latino Culture.  Rich or poor, everybody chips-in in times of need.

In that regard this is an excellent film, which turns out to be an homage that the writer / director Harold Trompetero [IMDb] [FAes]* was making TO HIS OWN DAD who went through many of the difficulties described in the film.

Good job!  Very good job!


* Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser. 

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Dark Glasses (orig. Espejuelos Oscuros) [2015]

MPAA (UR would be R)  Fr. Dennis (4+ Stars)

IMDb listing
AdoroCinema listing*
PeliCuba listing*

Diario de las Americas (L. Lionel León)  article*
Miami Herald (R. Rodriguez) article

Cocalecas.net (R. Piralta Riguad) interview w. director*
CubaCine.cu (A. Martín Pastrana) interview w. director*
NewTimes-Miami (N. Martinez) interview w. director
OnCuba.com interview w. director

ACN.cu (M. Hernández Martínez) review*
NewTimes- Miami (A. Martinez) review

Dark Glasses (orig. Espejuelos Oscuros) [2015] [AC]* (written and directed by Jessica Rodríguez [IMDb] [AC]*) is ANOTHER TRULY REMARKABLE FILM -- here a CUBAN (and SPANISH) "small indie" film (a characterization which when talking about a place like CUBA immediately takes on a VERY INTERESTING SIGNIFICANCE) -- that played recently at the 32nd (2016) Chicago Latino Film Festival after making stirs at both the Havana International Festival for New Latin American Cinema in Dec. 2015 where it played for three round-the-block sellout audiences (despite it being generally considered doubtful that it'll receive a license for general theatrical release in Cuba anytime soon...) and then at the Miami International Film Festival in March 2016.

Indeed, the film crosses all kinds of boundaries:  The Cuban-born but now Spain-residing writer-director  Jessica Rodríguez [IMDb] [AC]* who got her initial degree in film-making in Cuba but has since studied in Spain and even in the United States, using Spanish crowd-sourced money, nonetheless filmed this movie in Cuba utilizing the services of two very well known Cuban actors -- Laura de la Uz [IMDb] [FAes]* and José Alberto García [IMDb] [FAes]*.  Further, her script, which she penned while still a student in Cuba, leans on both the story of Scheherazade [wikip] of a 1001 Nights [wikip] [GR] [WCat] [Amzn] and the classic Cuban Communist Era film Lucia [1968] the latter which she arguably subverts.   Again, this is one heck of a film ;-).

So then, to the movie itself:

It tells the story of Esperanza (played by Laura de la Uz [IMDb] [FAes]*) who finds herself in a terrible situation.  An escaped criminal named Mario (played by José Alberto García [IMDb] [FAes]*) had broken into her home in the Cuban hinterlands to hide from police and has made it clear that he plans to rape her before making his next move.

Playing for time, Esperanza asks Mario to read to her ... three stories (from different periods in Cuban history) all interestingly involving both rather steamy situations (which interest Mario) and female empowerment or at least putting powerful men in their place (which is why Esperanza had collected them).

Now why would Esperanza get Mario to do this?  Well ... Mario quickly comes to feel sorry for Esperanza because she appears to be almost blind.  He may be a desperate man, but he's not completely Evil, even though, of course, he really wants to rape her, but then not necessarily "beat her over the head and take her" (he'd like her to at least partly want him).  Anyway, she tells him that she loves hearing these stories (and since she's blind, she can't read them herself).  AND she promises him that they're steamy enough that HE'D enjoy them too.

So ... Mario decides to "read her a story or two ..." ultimately three, and, well, they're compelling stories:

One's set in the 1970s (during the height of the Communist Era) involving a hot "hooker" / "seemingly Communist informer" Marlene who eventually gets her revenge (quite amusingly) on her lecherous Communist Party-member boss.  (This is why I personally don't think that this film will play anytime soon in regular Cuban theaters ... or if it does, then honestly Cuba will have changed quite a bit ...).

The second is set during late 1950s just before the fall of the Battista regime in which a Battista police officer tortures young Cuban (left-wing) student who's in love with the same woman as he.  However, by the time the police officer is done with the student, he's probably revealed more about himself than he'd like ...

Finally, the last story is set during the 1890 Cuban War for Independence and again a Cuban revolutionary (or perhaps loyalist it's not necessarily clear) is outsmarted by a Cuban woman (who incidently, like Esperanza, lives alone out in the Cuban countryside) who turns out to be able to keep her loyalties closer to the vest than he.

And by the end of the third story Esperanza, in fact, is able to find a way to outwit Mario as well.  (I'm not going to say how ...)

Readers here who know something of Scheherazade [wikip] of a 1001 Nights [wikip] [GR] [WCat] [Amzn] and then the signature Communist Era film Lucia [1968] will see the obvious similarities / references to both.

Anyway, it makes for one heck of a film and it'll be very interesting to see if the film does find its way to play not merely at a rarified Havana Film Festival but out in the Provinces to general Cuban audiences as well.

Great job!


* Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser. 

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The Moving Forest (orig. A Floresta que se Move) [2016]

+

MPAA (UR would be PG-13) Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
AdoroCinema listing*

Criticos.com.br (L.F. Gallego) review*
A Folha do São Paulo (C. Starling Carlos) review*
O Globo (S. Schild) review*


The Moving Forest (orig. A Floresta que se Move) [2016] [IMDb] [AC]* (directed and cowritten by Vinicius Coimbra [IMDb] [AC]* along with  Manuela Dias [IMDb] [AC]*) is a CONTEMPORARY BRAZILIAN (URUGUAYAN SET) DRAMA based on the Shakesperean play Macbeth and was made in honor of the recent 400th Anniversary of Shakespeare's birth.  The film played recently at the 32nd (2016) Chicago Latino Film Festival.

Elias (played by Gabriel Braga Nunes [IMDb] [AC]*) and César (played by Ângelo Antônio [IMDb] [AC]*) come home from a distant business trip.  At the airport they run into a strange "knitting lady" who greets Elias as the "Vice President" of his Bank.  Taken aback (he does not know her, and she's wrong) he corrects her that he's but a Financial Officer of the his Bank.  She repeats that today he's the "Vice President" and that tomorrow he could be "President" of the Bank.

The two arrive at their Bank's Headquarters and the Bank's President Heitor (played by Nelson Xavier [IMDb] [AC]*) tells them that indeed both of them are being promoted.  The previous VP had been forced to resign because of scandal, Elias is to take the VP's job and César, Elias'.  Elias is both surprised and impressed, that old woman had been right.

He comes home and tells his beautiful wife Clara (played by Ana Paula Arósio [IMDb] [AC]*) the news, that he's become Vice President at the Bank and that he's invited Heitor over to dinner at their stunning, modern, if certainly "cold" stone-steel-and-glass mansion at the outskirts of the city.  On hearing this, all that Clara can think of is how to knock-off Heitor when he comes over, telling Elias "a chance like this WON'T come again."

Elias initially discounts Clara's suggestions.  Yet, as with ... ambition starts to get the better of him.  Clara's right, there won't another chance like this ever again, and that strange old knitter was right as well.  He COULD become President (of the bank) "in a day."

The rest of the story ensues ... ;-)

I did find the film to be a very good adaptation.  I also have to say that Elias / Clara's citadel, sleek, modern but (air conditioned) COLD was a REMARKABLE re-imagination of an "Old Scottish Castle" even if it was located in a quite WARM WEATHER location like CONTEMPORARY BRAZIL / URUGUAY today ;-).

Anyway, I do think that MANY Shakespeare lovers would enjoy what the film makers did with the play here in this film.

Good, good job! ;-)


* Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser. 

< NOTE - Do you like what you've been reading here?  If you do then consider giving a small donation to this Blog (sugg. $6 _non-recurring_) _every so often_ to continue/further its operation.  To donate just CLICK HERE.  Thank you! :-) >

The Greatest House in the World (orig. La Casa más Grande del Mundo [2015]

MPAA (UR would be PG)  Fr. Dennis (4+ Stars)

IMDb listing
FilmAffinity.com/es listing*

Celuloide Digital (F. Flynn) review*
Konexion.com.mx (R. Rosales Santos) review*
PrensaLibre.com (AP) review*
Revés.com (A.C. Guzmán) review*
ViveIberoAmerica.com (J.F. Caballero) review*

The Hollywood Reporter (J. Mintzner) review

The Greatest House in the World (orig. La Casa más Grande del Mundo [2015[ [IMDb] [FAes]* (codirected by Ana V. Bojorquez [IMDb] [FAes]* and Lucía Carreras [IMDb] [FAes]*, screenplay cowritten by Ana V. Bojorquez [IMDb] and Edgar Sajcabún [IMDb], story by Edgar Sajcabún [IMDb]) a small "indie" GUATEMALAN / MEXICAN COPRODUCTION, is among this year's Chicago Latino Film Festival's offerings ONE BEST / MOST EMOTIONALLY COMPELLING FILMS that I've seen since beginning my blog

The film tells the very simple story of a ten year old girl named Rocio (played magnificently by "a local" Gloria López [IMDb] [FAes]) growing-up with her mother (played by Mexican actress Miriam Bravo [IMDb] [FAes]*) and grandmother (played by "local" Fabiana Ortiz [IMDb] [FAes]*) out in the cragy and often mist covered hinterlands of N.W. (Huehuetenango / ) Guatemala close to the border of Mexico.

Neither Rocío's father nor _any_ other males of working age appear in the entire film, even though, Rocio's mother was very much pregnant in the story.  Why weren't there any young / middle age males in the story, I asked the director present for Q/A at the end of the screening, believing sincerely (and not necessarily unsympathetically) that there probably a feminist statement being made there.  Instead, the director quite sincerely responded that this is a part of Guatemala where almost all the working-age males _go up north_ (to Mexico and beyond to the United States) in hopes _to find better work_ to support the families that they leave behind at home.

So ... Rocio, who up to this point has been going-out with her mother each morning, herding the family's 15-20 or so sheep, playing with rocks on the (rocky...) pastures pretending that she's gonna build "the grandest house in the world" up there with those rocks ... comes to a day when, ma' is simply too close to delivery to go out with the sheep anymore.  And so ma' and grandma entrust Rocio to take the sheep out that day; ROCIO's "growing up" ;-)

'Cept, PUT YOURSELVES IN ROCIO'S SHOES ... this proves to be a pretty awesome responsibility.  Those 15-20 rather stubborn, not particularly bright sheep (and they have no dog to keep them together) represent a fair amount of this family's wealth (sheep aren't called LIVE STOCK for nothing).  And so poor Rocio who soon runs into a friend named Ixchumil (played by "local" but unrelated María López [IMDb] [FAes]*) perhaps a year or two older also tending her family's 15-20 sheep, and then a little boy their age (played by "local" Elder Escobedo [IMDb] [FAes]*) with a sling-shot and after being little kids out in the field, alone, playing, acting like regular 10-12 year olds, Rocio finds to her horror that she's "lost lone of her sheep," the littlest one in fact.

What to do?  She has to look for it.  Ixchumil and the little boy help her out for a bit, but then Ixchumil as only a 12 y.o. could say, tells Rocio that SHE has to go home with HER sheep or else SHE will get into trouble with HER family.  Sho Rocio's soon "out there, all alone" with her remaining 14-19 sheep looking for "the lost sheep."

She comes to the hut of an old man (played wonderfully, if not particularly helpfully it turns out by "local" Daniel Ramirez [IMDb] [FAes]*) who tells her that he _may_ have heard a sheep bleeting by a nearby ravine.  Rocio runs there and finds her lost sheep, but when she gets back to the old man's hut, her other sheep are now gone.  What happened?   Well, the old man is not Evil, just not particularly useful / reliable (anymore) ... the sheep just seemed to run away.

Sigh ... PUT YOURSELVES AGAIN IN 10 Y/O ROCIO'S SHOES ... this is the first day that Rocio was out with the family's sheep and ... SHE'S LOST MOST OF THEM.

You just want to cry ...

I asked the director about obvious Biblical allusions (this past Sunday, was, in fact "Good Shepherd Sunday" - 4th Sunday of Easter) as well as a possible influence of a WONDERFUL CLASSIC ITALIAN FILM, Vittorio DiSeca's Bicycle Thieves (Ladri di Biciclette) [1948], and the director responded that certainly I was not the first to ask about the possible Biblical allusions, or about other films that touched on similar quite universal themes.  However, she said that she and her collaborators, who incidentally studied in Cuba, were _most inspired_ by Iranian cinema, and specifically a famous Iranian, similarly minimalist (and Oscar Nominated) film named Children of Heaven [1997] which was also about children, responsibility and the facing of frightful / unfairly significant loss.

Anyway, this is one heck of a film ... and as a MINOR (but IMHO _necessary_) SPOILER I just want to assure Readers here that when Rocio comes home after a clearly VERY ROUGH "FIRST DAY" ... the story DOESN'T END in an altogether sad way.  After all, she's coming home ... to family.

Again, wow, what a story!  And I do hope that after it completes its festival rounds, this film will happily become available on DVD / for streaming.  It's well worth the cry and the view.


* Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser. 

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The Jungle Book [2016]

MPAA (PG) CNS/USCCB (A-II)  ChicagoTribune (3 Stars)  RE.com (4 Stars)  AVClub (B-)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J. McAleer) review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RogerEbert.com (M. Zoller Seitz) review
AVClub (I. Vishnevetsky) review


The Jungle Book [2016] (directed by Jon Favreau, screenplay by Justin Marks, based on the classic children's book [wikip] [GR] [WCat] [Amzn] [IMDb] by Rudyard Kipling [wikip] [GR] [WCat] [Amzn] [IMDb]) is a remarkable testament to the potential of our times.  What else could one say about a hyper-REALISTIC ... children's tale complete with talking, indeed SINGING bears (thanks Bill Murray ;-)  that look like the ones one'd run into in Yellowstone.

Yes, I can immediately imagine how technology could soon disemploy all future generations of actors, doomed soon to compete against Studio-OWNED eternal CGI hyper-realistic "clip art" versions of Brad Pitt, Scarlett Johansson, or even an army of Computer-Enhanced Kumars (er Kal Penns) or Woody Allens ;-).   But that's for another more dystopic SciFi-ish film to explore (Attn: film-makers, I'd want some credit and my Order could certainly use the royalties ;-)   For now, let's just bask in THE AWESOMENESS of watching Bill Murray voicing a good-natured (if somewhat morally lacking ;-) SINGING CGI bear who looked like he _could_ have been just as ferocious (if he tried ... ;-) as the CGI bear that nearly tore-to-pieces Leonardo DiCaprio's character in The Revenant [2015].  Again, what a remarkable time we live in!

The story?  Oh, yes, the story ... ;-).  It follows the basic outline of the story of  Mowgli [wikip] [IMDb] (played here by Neel Sethi) from Kipling's original Jungle Book [wikip] [GR] [WCat] [Amzn] with obvious influences from the Disney's 1967 animated version as well as The Lion King [1994]. 

Mowgli [wikip] [IMDb] was a human baby that was left abandoned and defenseless in the Indian jungle of the British Raj Era after his parents were killed by a tiger Shere Khan [wikip] [IMDb] (voiced in the current version by Idris Elba).  Saved by a panther named Bagheera [wikip] [IMDb] (voiced here by Ben Kingsley) and given-over by said panther to a pack of wolves led by Akela [wikip] [IMDb] (voiced by Giancarlo Esposito) and Raksha [wikip] [IMDb] (voiced here by Lupita Nyong'o) for raising. 

The film begins with 10 y/o Mowgli happily running about the jungle with his follow wolf-step-brothers nobody caring (much) that he was "a bit different" than the other wolf cubs, 'cept when Mowgli occasionally just does one of his "human tricks" (spontaneously using _some item_ like a shell or a stick as a tool).  At those times he's told quite forthrightly that his behavior (human trick) was "inappropriate" for "life (among animals) in the jungle" ;-).

All seems to be going well until ... Shere Khan the tiger reenters (after a many year absence) Mowgli's life, wanting to kill him, and Bagheera then to wolf-mother Raksha's dismay tells Mowgli that they're going to have to get him to a human village so that he could be safe (from said tiger).

Much then ensues ... including Mowgli's much above mentioned encounter (followed by somewhat complicated friendship) with Baloo the Bear [wikip] [IMDb] (voiced with splendid ever slothful "this is soo much work" disconcern by Bill Murray ;-), as well as a temptress snake named Kaa [wikip] [IMDb] (and voiced wonderfully by Scarlet Johannson) and a true "800 pound of a Mobster gorilla (er orangutan)" King Louie (from Disney's 1967 adaptation) [IMDb] (voiced by Christopher Walken).

It all makes for one heck of a story ;-)

Great job folks!  Great job!


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The Oak's Shadow (orig. La Sombra del Roble) 2015]

MPAA (UR would be PG-13)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
FilmAffinity/es listing
CineChile.cl listing*

ElMostrador.cl (E. Morales Lastra) review
Revista del Séptimo Arte (I.  Torrealba Ramírez) review


The Oak's Shadow (orig. La Sombra del Roble) 2015] [IMDb] [FAes]*[CChl]* (directed by Nicolás Saldivia [IMDb] [FAes]*[CChl]*, screenplay by Paloma Miranda [IMDb] [CChl]* and Michelle Redôn [IMDb] [CChl]*) is a very well written  and well acted / crafted "small indie" FAMILY DRAMA from CHILE that played recently at the 32nd (2016) Chicago Latino Film Festival.

The film tells the story of a random middle class family living in Santiago, Chile today.  Remarkable in this film is that the characters of all four of the family's members -- the 40-something father named Jorge (played by Daniel Candia [IMDb] [FAes] [CChl]), his university aged son Pascual (played by Vicente Almuna [IMDb] [FAes] [CChl] and 12-13 y.o. daughter Elisa (played by Francisca Poloni [IMDb] [FAes] [CChl]) as well as Jorge's 70-something y.o. father Roberto (played by Julio Jung [IMDb] [FAes] [CChl]), who by all accounts had been holding the family together emotionally since Jorge's wife - Pascual / Elisa's mother - died, some 5 years before) -- are well developed.  As such, fascinatingly, it could be said that ALL FOUR OF THESE CHARACTERS are true "protagonists" (rather than merely "supporting characters") in the story. 

What drives the family to "crisis" -- after 5 years of quiet deceptively quiet passage of time in which Pascual and Elisa were of course "growing-up" (and Jorge / Roberto were "growing older") -- was that Roberto comes to be diagnosed with  and incipient Alzheimer's, and all those conversations that did not take place and internal family disappointments / difficulties that were never confronted, now begin to come home to roost.

This is a deceptively quiet yet quite emotional film that I do believe a lot of Viewers would be able to relate to.  NO ONE is "evil" in this story, but, wow, can life be hard at times.

Again, a very, very well written / crafted tale.


* Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser. 

< NOTE - Do you like what you've been reading here?  If you do then consider giving a small donation to this Blog (sugg. $6 _non-recurring_) _every so often_ to continue/further its operation.  To donate just CLICK HERE.  Thank you! :-) >>

Barbershop 3: The Next Cut [2016]

MPAA (PG-13) CNS/USCCB (L)  Chicago SunTimes (3 1/2 Stars)  RE.com (3 Stars)  AVClub (B-)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (L) review
ChicagoSunTimes (R. Roeper) review
RogerEbert.com (O. Henderson) review
AVClub (J. Hassenger) review

BET.com coverage
Essence.com coverage
TheSource.com coverage

My hat off to Ice Cube, Cedric the Entertainer and then to the rest of the cast, makers and crew of Barbershop 3: The Next Cut [2016] (directed by Malcolm D. Lee, screenplay by Kenya Barris and Tracy Oliver, characters by Mark Brown).  They revived this Chicago-set movie franchise in a most timely / poignant way.

The South Side of Chicago is at Ground Zero of many of the problems facing our country these days.  Hence, it was a joy listening to the banter, granted still scripted and at times exaggerated (a little) for laughs, of still basically regular people portrayed as living in what hopefully will be remembered one day as quite irregular times.  For for several years now not a single weekend goes by without people being killed on Chicago's streets most often on the South and West Sides.

Indeed, I found it quite sobering this past Easter (a few weeks past) when the Pastors from these parts of the city organized a city-wide "Cease Fire" AT LEAST FOR THE EASTER HOLIDAY and at least on Easter Sunday itself it proved to be a success.   [Note here that a good part of the current film is about the folks at the Barber Shop organizing a similar weekend long "Cease Fire" in which in lieu of violence, the barbers / beauticians offered free hair cuts / styling for 48 hours straight to all comers.

THESE KIND OF EFFORTS NEED TO BE ENCOURAGED BY ALL PEOPLE OF PEACE, AS ALSO WHAT FR. MICHAEL PFLEGER HAS BEEN CALLING FOR AS WELL: OPPORTUNITIES / HOPE BE OFFERED TO YOUNG PEOPLE FROM THESE PARTS OF THE CITY SO THAT THEY COULD HAVE MORE COMMUNITY IN THEIR LIVES THAN THAT OFFERED BY ... GANGS.

Honestly folks, while the language and situations may not be for the youngest of viewers and the film would probably scandalize at times "the older folks" of all races (all our parents / grandparents go to Church, and were brought up in a different way), this is still a wonderful movie for the vast majority of Americans to see. It's about our brothers and sisters living in / trying to navigate circumstances that ALL OF US UNDERSTAND and ALL OF US would _really like to run from_.

'Cept some of us _can't_ and _what would happen if all of us did_?

Honestly, a film to be proud of.  Great, great job!


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The Similars (orig. Los Parecidos) [2015]

MPAA (UR would be R)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
FilmAffinity.com/es listing*

El Panda review*
En la Butaca review*
Proyector Fantasma (M. Santillan) review*

Moria - SF,H&F Film Review (R. Scheib) review
Scream Horror Mag (A. Hunt) review
Twitch Film (A. Mack) review

Variety (D. Harvey) review

The Similars (orig. Los Parecidos) [2015] [IMDb] [FAes]* (written and directed by Isaac Ezban [IMDb] [FAes]*) is a MEXICAN TWILIGHT ZONE-ISH SCI-FI THRILLER / PERIOD PIECE that played recently at the 32nd (2016) Chicago Latino Film Festival.  Ezban had scored a hit at last year's Festival with a similarly "weird" Twilight Zone-ish [1959-1964] [wikip] [IMDb] film The Incident [2014].

The story presented largely in palish green b&w is set at a remote bus station some five hours (normally) from Mexico City on the evening of October 1, 1968 during a massive (and freak) rain storm.

Readers Note that this date is significant, as early in the morning of Oct 2, 1968, Mexican security forces massacred hundreds of students who had been protesting during the summer in the lead-up to the 1968 Mexico City Summer Olympic Games.  The Tlatelolco Massacre as it came to be remembered became a universally acknowledged event in Mexico though almost never spoken of until recent years.  The film Tlatelolco, Summer of 68 (orig. Tlatelolco, Verano del 68) [2013] by another young Mexican director, Carlos Bolado, played at this Festival back in 2014.

Back to the current story ...

The rain storm had both delayed all buses and largely severed communications.  There's a single public phone booth in the station's waiting room but between the noise of the pounding rain on the station's roof and then its presumed effect on the cables / connections outside it's almost impossible for anyone using said phone (probably terrible in the best of circumstances) to understand anything said over it.  Similarly, the driving rain has caused even the radio to sound garbled.  So on this "dark and stormy night" the people in this random, smallish bus depot in provincial Mexico some five hours from the Capital find themselves quite especially isolated.

Then, ask yourselves dear Readers, who'd be out on a terrible / freak night such as this?  Clearly already those already quite marginalized or otherwise pushed by circumstances to extremes.

So while the station's night manager, 60-something Martín (played by Fernando Becerril [IMDb] [FAes]*), a few weeks from retirement, could have expected a quiet night in which he could spend most of it in the station's backroom leafing through 50s-60s era still largely b&w pornography... he finds his station filling up with increasingly disparate (and desperate) people.

The first to arrive is a 30-40 something miner named Ulises (played by Gustavo Sánchez Parra [IMDb] [FAes]*) who's wife is in Mexico City (at the in-laws...) about to give birth.  Despite the obvious storm, he can't believe that the buses are delayed.

Next appears an elderly indigenous woman (played by María Elena Olivares [IMDb] [FAes]*) who speaks no Spanish, only her native tongue, and yet clearly is convinced that something deeply wrong is afoot with this terrible storm and _immediately_ does not like Ulises.

A very pregnant woman named Irene (played by Cassandra Ciangherotti [IMDb] [FAes]*) soon arrives fleeing (again braving that terrible rain storm), fleeing her abusive husband.  Then a paranoid taxi driver :-) / "night school" student named Álvaro (played by Humberto Busto [IMDb] [FAes]*) who probably "reads too much" (or certainly the wrong stuff) comes to the station wanting to "join the students in the Capital." And he's absolutely convinced that this freak storm is some sort of "a plot" even if he's not sure it's a Gringo one, a Soviet one or EVEN an extraterrestrial one.

Finally, forty-something year old harried mother (of some means) named Gertridis (played by Carmen Beato [IMDb] [FAes]*) along with her oddly if quite seriously ill 10-12 y/o son Ignacio (played by Santiago Torres [IMDb] [FAes]*) arrive, he with an oxygen tank and a strange 50s-60s era breathing apparatus and with a shunt installed near the top of his shoulder for direct injections into his chest.  What the heck is wrong with him?  We do not know, but clearly it's very very serious.

So we have this odd collection of variously traumatized people collecting at this random provincial bus station, with a _massive storm_ (complete with thunder / lightning) POUNDING on the roof / glass front outside, with the radio -- mostly garbled of course -- occasionally coming in clear enough to warn of some massive if unclear "troubles" occurring all around the planet.  And then ...    

... the people in the station "begin to change."  How do they change?  Well, that's part of the charm of the movie ;-)  The change that occurs is both kinda amusing (to us Viewers "looking in" ;-) but to the characters involved, there in that cursed bus station at that time, it would be quite terrifying.

Now _why_ would they be "changing"?  Well, that's (of course) "open to interpretation" ;-).  Readers, remember only that the "paranoid Sci-Fi horror flicks" of the 1950s-60s to which this film clearly pays homage were set in the context of the Cold War with its Apocalyptic threat universal nuclear destruction causing, at minimum, for people almost _all people_ "to change" ;-).  

Anyway, my hat off to writer / director Isaac Ezban [IMDb] [FAes].*  You've certainly caught the attention of a fair number SciFi / Horror cinemaphiles around the world.  And I'm certainly looking forward to see what comes next ;-)

Great ... if quite paranoid ... job! ;-)


* Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser. 

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Andrea & Lorenzo [2015]

MPAA (UR would be PG-13)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
Official Website


Andrea & Lorenzo [2015] (written and directed by Rolando D'Lugo [IMDb]) is a CHEERFUL truly "small indie" ROMANTIC COMEDY from PUERTO RICO that played recently at the 32nd (2016) Chicago Latino Film Festival.
 
The film's writer/director/one of its leads, Rolando D'Lugo, who's also Puerto Rican rock musician (and is responsible for the film's honestly quite _impressive_ sound track) and teaches media studies in Puerto Rico, was present to take questions at the end of the screening.  He said that the film will be released in theaters in Puerto Rico at the end of April 2016 and is presently negotiating with various Latino television channels to have it play on TV across Latin America.  Eventually the film should become available for rental / streaming on NetFlix. (I suggested that he also try to make it available through iTunes and/or Amazon Instant Video)

The film tells the story of Andrea (played by Joa Tous) and Lorenzo (played by Rolando D'Lugo) introduced to us as a young Puerto Rican college age couple, she studying writing, he a somewhat brooding musician, each facing some challenges to their dreams:

Andrea's being told that her writing is really "quite average" and if she still really wants to make a living in writing that she really ought to start looking into "writing copy" for one or another "glossy entertainment magazine."  Sigh, Frida [wikip] poster in her room notwithstanding, her Prof's telling her that she's _not_ going to be the next "Gabo" (Gabriel García Márquez) [wikip] [GR] [WCat] [Amzn].

Lorenzo, on the other hand, is not getting anywhere with his music either.  Andrea would like him to just take a job in her father's warehouse.  Instead, Lorenzo would like to pick-up-sticks and go down to Argentina, where "it's another world" and where he believes he has a much better shot to get his rock career going.  Lorenzo asks Andrea to come with him.  Shaking her head, she says no.  And so ... the two break up.

... Skip to 5 years later.  Andrea's finds herself working for / increasingly successful at "an entertainment magazine" called "Chica Ye" and Lorenzo finds himself coming back to Puerto Rico in triumph as the lead guitarist for a Latino rock band called "Agua Luna."  And guess who Andrea's boss wants Andrea to follow / interview during week-long several stop tour of the Island?

Much of course ensues ... ;-)

A truly charming aspect of this RomCom is that since the cast is mostly composed of (college) student actors, they actually look their parts.  (Often American RomComs are filled with far more professional actors but also significantly older than the characters they're asked to play).

Rolando D'Lugo does play the "brooding musician" quite well and the songs played in the film are actually his own. 

Then Joa Tous plays her role as Andrea quite authentically and with an endearing and often spot-on comic touch (seriously, her timing was very good).  Her coworkers / friends Alicia, Cynthia and Mario (played by Sandra Ortiz, Blanca Lissette Cruz and Edwin Yumar respectively) look and sound like people that Andrea would hang around.  Older characters, like Andrea's boss Aurelio (played by Orlando Rodríguez), Lorenzo's manager Martín (played by William Piedra) and even a priest (played by Jacobo Morales) were again both well cast and well (authentically) played.

 My one complaint would be that even though the movie was made in a manner that it could easily play standard TV (basically PG-13), nevertheless the two main characters do end-up in bed several times during the course of the film.  It's all done in a manner that would certainly (though _technically_) "pass the censors."   HOWEVER, Latino parents of younger teens may not be particularly happy with this aspect of the film which seems to take it for granted that young 20-somethings "in love" are going to sleep with each other even if they're not married or when marriage is not even anywhere near the table.


I mention this criticism as one who otherwise really liked the film's generally light / youthful outlook.

Otherwise, honestly very, very good job!  And honestly best wishes for your futures!


* Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser. 

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Demolition [2016]

MPAA (R) CNS/USCCB ()  ChicagoTribune (2 Stars)  RE.com (2 Stars)  AVClub (C+)  Fr. Dennis (2 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB () review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RogerEbert.com (G. Kenny) review
AVClub (I. Vishnevetsky) review


Demolition [2016] (directed by Jean-Marc Vallée, screenplay by Bryan Sipe) is a decent enough if IMHO incomplete "small indie piece" about a random New York "suit" named Davis (played by Jake Gyllenhaal) who in the opening scene of the movie loses his wife Julia (played by Heather Lind) seated right next to him in the car, driving (they're in the midst of having of a random / routine not particularly intense argument...) in the blink of an eye due to a car accident.  Davis survived said accident without a scratch...

Wow.  Waking-up in the hospital he's informed that his wife passed away.  Groggy, stunned, shocked, he goes over to a random vending machine in the corner of the Intensive Care Ward, small splotches of blood from his now (again, he's just been informed) deceased wife still on his clothes, puts in a $1.25 for a small bag of "Peanut M&Ms" and ... the machine gets stuck.  The receptionist at the Intensive Care Ward simply tells him, "These things happen sometime."

Irritated (and barely standing...) in a haze of many, many, many layers of still undifferentiated emotions, he takes down the number of the culpable vending machine and in the days that follow (in the midst of funeral preparations ...) writes very, very long, obviously _needlessly_ long letter to its owners asking for "a refund."  In the subsequent days, he writes three or four more such letters, never particularly angry, just spilling his guts even as he can't seem to differentiate between the random/awful SUDDEN LOSS OF HIS WIFE (!) with ... losing five quarters in a random vending machine.   Again ... wow.

Why would that be?  Well, that's the rest of the movie.

Needless to say, Davis' gut-wrenching letters eventually get a heartfelt, tear-filled response from a random "Customer Service Rep" named Karen (played quite wonderfully by Naomi Watts) at the letters' receiving end.  Since the culpable vending machine was still a physical device, the company distributing and managing such devices "all about the greater New York area" remains local, allowing Karen, who by the end Davis' fourth letter "knows him" (perhaps far more than she'd ever otherwise want to), to meet him, starting a necessarily awkward, post-awful-loss relationship (of sorts) between them.

I do believe that the necessary clumsiness of said "relationship" that develops between the two is a strength in the film: After receiving the kind of letters that Davis sends Karen's firm, it's hard to imagine a "flesh and blood" person on the letters' receiving end _not wanting_ to "reach out." Yet Karen, of course, has her own life with its own complications -- a 12-13 year-old son (played again quite well by Judah Lewis) trying to figure himself out as he enters teenage-hood as well as an already somewhat inappropriate relationship with her (blue-collarish) boss (played by C.J. Wilson).

Then Davis does not exist totally in a vacuum: His wife had parents, Phil and Margot (played excellently by Chris Cooper and less convincingly by Polly Draper) who had loved her and this dynamic -- Davis' own hazy and complicated ambivalence towards his deceased wife versus the utterly unconditional love that her parents had for her -- is certainly well explored.

WHAT LACKS IN MY OPINION is a strong to say nothing of _credible_ presence of ANY family or friends on Davis' side.  NOW PERHAPS IT IS POSSIBLE that this would be the case.  THERE ARE, PERHAPS, PEOPLE who are SO "DETACHED" from the rest of humanity / the world BUT ... IMHO such people tend to populate Movies (and specifically Hollywood movies) more than Reality.  (I think of the Classic Hollywood film Casablanca [1942] ... think how DIFFERENT that movie would have been if Humphrey Bogart's character, or for that matter "Sam" ... "had moms" ;-).  In Reality, they certainly would have had "mothers who loved them" ... but their mere existence, even "far far away" would have radically changed the story ;-).  I do understand that making Davis effectively a "monad" greatly simplifies the story and that this can work to the screen-writer's / film-makers' advantage.  BUT IMHO it also impoverishes the story's potential.  

In any case in an attempt to deal with both his grief and (as becomes increasingly evident as the story progresses) his now necessarily unresolved / unresolveable issues with his deceased wife, Davis embarks on disassembling all kinds of initially random but increasingly significant objects (ending with his house).  Does this bring him peace?  Different Viewers will have different opinions, but IMHO that he actually embarks on "doing something" which when one finds oneself depressed is the (hardest) first step, he starts "moving" (and progressively _feeling_) again.

The rest of the story then unspools from there ...

IMHO this was not a bad film ... but I do think that it needlessly cut corners in its attempt to tell the story.  As such, the story felt, to me anyway, truncated / incomplete.  Nevertheless, I do believe that the film could give Viewers a fair amount to reflect on and perhaps help them appreciate some of the grieving process of those who lose a significant other with whom they did have a (perhaps necessarily) "complex" relationship.

A (fairly) good job then, a (fairly) good job!


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Age of Cannibals (orig. Zeit der Kannibalen) [2014]

MPAA (UR would be R)  Fr. Dennis (2 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CinEuropa.org listing
Film-Zeit.de listing*

Goethe.de (J. Brendemühl) review
KunstUndFilm.de (D. Streisow) review*
Spielfilm.de (G. Torinus) review*

The Hollywood Reporter (B. van Hoeij) review

Age of Cannibals (orig. Zeit der Kannibalen) [2014] [IMDb] [CEu] [FZ.de]* (directed by Johannes Naber [IMDb] [CEu] [FZ.de]*, screenplay by Stefan Weigl [IMDb] [CEu] [FZ.de]*) is an award winning GERMAN DRAMEDY that won both critical acclaim / awards back home that played recently at the 19th (2016) Chicago European Union Film Festival held at the Gene Siskel Film Center here in Chicago.
 
The story plays-out entirely in a couple of hotel suites somewhere on say the 10th or 12th floor of an appropriately sleek "executive hotel" in Lagos, Nigeria, it's about two high flying if often quite clueless German business consultants Frank Öllers (played by Devid Striesow [IMDb] [CEu] [FZ.de]*) and Kai Niederländer (played by Sebastian Blomberg [IMDb] [CEu] [FZ.de]*).  At behest of their firm (back in Germany) they have been "doing business" / "consulting" from their rather comfortable if necessarily _ever temporary_ perch out there on said 10th or 12th floor of said "executive hotel" in Lagos, Nigeria for a fair amount of time.

After a while, it would be fair for Viewers to ask themselves if these two were actually "in exile" out there in Nigeria (because the firm didn't really want them "at the home office" back home ;-).  Indeed, the two seem quite frustrated because while "the home office" seems to encourage them, constantly tell them how good of a job they are doing ... way out there in Nigeria ... yet, both feel that they've been repeatedly "passed-up" for being "partners" in the firm.  They get even more nervous when "the firm" seems to send a third person, Bianca März (played by Katharina Schüttler [IMDb] [CEu] [FZ.de]*) is sent by "the home office" out there to Nigeria to join them.  Why has _she_ come?  Not only is _she_ a woman, but she's also been "with the firm" for _so much less time than they have_.

Ah, office politics ...

But said office politics aside, what were _they_ doing there on the 10th or 12th floor of a random executive hotel in the captial of a random "developing country" with "potential?"  And more to the point, did _they_ know _what they are doing_?

One gets the sense that they didn't.  Near the beginning of the film we hear these two smiling German consultants telling an Indian manager Singh (played by Romesh Ranganathan [IMDb] [FZ.de]*) of some Indian firm that they are "consulting" (who incidentally had to fly out from Bangalore, India to Lagos, Nigeria to receive their "consulting wisdom") THAT THEY BELIEVED that this Indian firm should pack-up and RELOCATE in Lahore, Pakistan.  Aghast, the Indian manager asks them: "Do you believe in reincarnation?"  "In a word, no." "Well hundreds of millions of Hindus in India do.  And to many of them the greatest curse is to be reincarnated as a Pakistani."  Exaggerated perhaps but it's true that predominantly Hindu India and predominantly Muslim Pakistan have not exactly "gotten along" since the two became independent together yet separately in 1947, three wars having been fought between the countries since then, and to some extent the main thing preventing a fourth one being that _both_ countries now possess nuclear weapons and no one could really predict what would happen if the two countries went at it (openly) again.   "Perhaps, but you're going to lose-out then on a lot of money saved in lower taxes and wages..."

Ah, Capitalism über alles...

While the two smiling "consultants" blithely hand-out advice derived from crunching their figures on their spread sheets while wondering why Bianca was there now, looking over their shoulder as they do this, we hear the occasional bomb or burst of what appears to rapid arms fire going-on outside.  Are the two, er three, worried?  Not particularly one of them, has even practiced, saying that he could get his suitcase packed in less than thirty seconds if they got a phone call "from the [German] Consulate" to do so.

Yet the gravity of the situation taking place _outside_ of their 10th to 12th story perch in the "executive hotel" where they were staying out there in Lagos, Nigeria becomes clearer when, after the two had taken a meeting with another business man Vicent Akume (played by Jaymes Butler [IMDb] [FZ.de]*) this time "a local" from Lagos pitching some sort of a random / probably unnecessary seaside (gated) executive park, Akume's sister (played by Joana Adu-Gyamfi [IMDb]) who had attended the meeting, very professionally, and _silently_ ("a step or two behind" her brother...) giving the pitch, suddenly, when she realizes the two Germans were not impressed and the meeting was going to end as a failure, begins _to strip_ out of her quite western very business-like attire, down to her bra and underwear and starts to BEG the two German "consultants": "Please, I'll do anything, just get me out of this coutnry.  You have NO IDEA what it's like to live here or what's coming ..."

And what's coming becomes progressively clearer...

The spacing between the bombs / exchanges of gun fire becomes increasingly shorter.  One starts to hear the breaking of windows, even presumably from the "Executive Hotel" where these German consultants were staying ... And it doesn't look like this story is going to end well ...

Okay, it all makes for a quite good story, and one that could easily be played-out on a stage.  My biggest problem with the film is its title, which while _perhaps_ could be taken in a general way (Capitalism as Cannibalism ...), still feels to this American's ears to be almost shockingly (and unfortunately) racist.  I do think that a title that would have highlighted the cluelessness of the "Consultants" would have suited the work better, like "Up in the Air," "In the Clouds," or even "The Unbearable Lightness of International Commerce (or Consulting)"

I write this because I would hope that the message of this film isn't that "Africans (or 'Third World people' in general) are savages."  And yet, one gets the sense that this is at least in part the film's message and IMHO that's pretty problematic...

Sigh, otherwise a pretty good, well executed film.


* Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser. 

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