magullon Reviews

The Chess Game (1994)

A genius in chess sad in love

[8/10 · 28 June 2009]

Max, 12 years old, a child and suicidal vagabond meets Ambrose, disillusioned pastor. The boy needed soon as a genius of chess. They go all out to conquer the world champion title. Fourteen years later, Max has become a dandy powder, strange and taciturn. Always accompanied by Ambroise, faithful coach, manager and protector. Max is confronted with the most elegant and most condescending Champions moments, Lord Staunton, during a meeting organized by the Machiavellian Marquise de Theux. This passion for chess and amorous intrigues give her daughter, the lovely Anne-Lise, the winner of this tournament. In a world of thriller, where the game does not stop at the scene, the protagonists are risking their lives and their mothers while behind a cliff, the sun goes down on a giant chessboard.

Sprint especial (2005 TV Movie)

A tribute to an effort for life

[7/10 · 25 June 2009]

By Xavier Etxaniz life you smile. After many efforts have achieved stability as a professional cyclist and also has a reality of your dreams: team shared with his brother Robert, who is deeply attached. His greatest success comes early: a heroic win one of the hardest stages of the Tour de France. But their existence makes an unexpected turn when, while training for a road, Robert and Xavier are run over a stupid accident. The Robert died on the spot. The chances of saving the life of Xavier are few, but the hope of his family keeps you withdraw ventilation. Miraculously, the Xavier recovers. Since this time, Xavier is facing the toughest period of his life. The rehabilitation is slow and can resume his career cyclist null. It is difficult to endure all the drama, but with the support of a family dedicated to the cause, slowly getting it. Over a year later, in what has happened tributes of his colleagues in the profession, which has always expressed its solidarity and admiration, the beautiful Xavier increased again (although it is symbolically) a bicycle. Although the physical and psychological sequels are unforgettable, the Xavier is a new challenge: to want to compete again. I do so in a series of special tests in which, moreover, gets good results. Become a new person, Xavier took part in the European Championships in Paralympics. Gets a few victories. The record of his brother redouble their forces and push to achieve the final victory in a highly disputed in the test road fund.

Cosas que hacen que la vida valga la pena (2004)

Mourn or laugh, or neither

[7/10 · 31 January 2009]

In what appears an attempt to mix drama and comedy, Manuel Gomez Pereira made this film, 'Things that make life worthwhile. "It is not an original discovery, by many voice you have (quite off the pitch, by the way), but it departs somewhat from the norm in the Spanish cinema. The downside is that the elements forming the film are poorly combined, and while some points are not well developed, others are out of place. A day in the lives of two people close to the median age. It's basically what the movie Gómez Pereira. Jorge (Eduard Fernandez) is a stationary (parado) one which, despite load on your back with a drama major, seems willing to see things change. Only this explains his commitment to a minor could mean a turning point in its existence. In line with Audrey Tautou of 'Long dating' (Jean-Pierre Jeunet, 2004), Jorge says things like this to herself: "if I find a coin before the corner that is now going to change my luck. " Of course it finds it, begins to play 'Today could be a great day' (Hoy puede ser un gran dia)by Joan Manuel Serrat and in a few crosses on its way Hortensia (Ana Belen).She is another woman entry age, divorced and a little lonely. Take valeriana for sleeping, organizes birthday parties as an exemplary mother, said her belief in God and leads to a speed of homicidal mother. Hortensia is a woman of many contradictions in his behavior, life was going in his head driving data as "70% of people fall in love only once in a lifetime" and said although it is short of Jorge and unemployed and does not preclude the possibility that it is a "sadistic" sleeping in his shoulder in the cinema at the earliest opportunity. Later came a communion, a dance in the luxurious wedding banquet, the back of a car and other things that players seem to live unique experiences like that but end up doing quite heavy for the viewer. 'Things that make life worthwhile' debate between us is the drama of two adult persons who have no other that leads them to see where their strange relationship and, conversely, make us take the case as a comedy, focusing on things like a Chinese singing at a wedding (which seem to be amusing in itself) or the gait of a drunk person. The problem is that it does not leave us time to connect with the players, therefore we can not identify with the dramatic, and not give us a solid base comic too, leaving everything except pure joke. In the end, all mixed in a way that the viewer no longer know very well whether to laugh or mourn, and ends up not doing either. And it is true that something is not seen a thousand times, is not the kind of film that we find to bend every corner, but it is not sufficiently different or special as we want to do. Ana Belén (which apparently far less than the 53 years that has in this film) and Eduard Fernandez are two actors who are very enjoyable to see working, but this time it seems ready or comfortable enough in scenes that require him to break the calm that prevails in the film, so in moments like the "accident" with the children of the bar thing seems to be slipping from their hands. Perhaps a very dramatic change that has to do, but that is no excuse to lower our guard. In any case, both interpreters are erected easily the highlight of the function. 'Things that make life worthwhile' work only up to the modest level of entertainment. Any claim that is beyond that point has not been fulfilled, as a romantic comedy or dramatic as that, we presume, they wanted to do, can not afford to have little moments finished successful (beyond bad) as that in which one of the characters talk and laugh, lost drunk, compared to a boy who remains in a coma in part because of him. Neither do much for people like Rosario Pardo, making the typical friend launched whose biggest contribution to the film is the phrase "must be screwed over," and songs from the soundtrack, though significant, not just fit. It is true that the film by Manuel Gomez Pereira has its hits (some of the moments involving Jose Sacristan), but the whole is a anodyne Story, a film with good intentions and a nice result when the better.

Oro nazi en Argentina (2004)

Nazi war criminals to Argentina

[8/10 · 31 January 2009]

Plot provides strong evidence and controversy about the arrival of Nazi war criminals to Argentina and their huge fortunes, claiming also the participation of Swiss banks, the Vatican State and the transfer of U.S. government. Unpublished testimonies, and very meticulous recreations endorsement of renowned researchers in the world, casts light on the darker legacy of Nazism. Filmed in magnificent scenery, "Nazi Gold in Argentina" will collect evidence and testimony in Buenos Aires, Rome, Madrid, Geneva and Zurich, within the streets of Berne up to the shores of the Baltic Sea in Germany, adding to the rigor documentary an alarming rate of police intrigue and espionage. The viewer to access micro-films recently released secret, it introduces genuine submarine of World War II and type, with hidden cameras at homes of people heavily involved in the handling of Nazi treasure. Based on the book by journalist Jorge Camarasa "Odessa south" the film is enriched with the backing of researchers from great international prestige, such as Jean Ziegler, and Uki Goñi Beatriz Gurevich, among others. The experience of victims and survivors collide dramatically with the chilling statements Wilfred Von Oven, a former secretary of Göbbels, or the child of the criminal Erich Priebke.

Dos auroras (2005)

Can you make a film bad, ugly, stupid?

[1/10 · 28 January 2009]

Empathy-impaired Aurora (Rojo) feigns interest in mega-depressed Mauricio (Tizoc Arroyo), her illegitimate son by famous entertainer Andres (Rogelio Guerra), who knows nothing of the boy's existence. Every year on his birthday, however, the idolized singer receives two gardenias from a mystery woman. Aurora tapes a shocker of a confession to be delivered to the man she's loved from afar -- very far afar -- since she was an impressionable lass of 14. Her revenge will prove to be just as rife with miscalculations as her life. Pic only transcends its tiny budget during Aurora's extended monologue. Several shots in which camera is upside down and characters appear to stroll along the ceiling have an arresting quality. Fittingly cheesy score complements the melodramatic narrative.

Judíos en el espacio (o por que es diferente esta noche a las demás noches) (2005)

Finish what started 16 years ago

[6/10 · 26 January 2009]

Written and directed by Gabriel Lichtmann (Buenos Aires, 1974), this film looks at the crises that followed the failed suicide attempt of Mauricio, an elderly Jewish man at a loss after the death of his wife. When his extended family determines that he cannot live by himself, they come together to decide what to do. The decision is put aside as members of the young generation decide to celebrate a traditional Seder. As the family struggles with to do with Mauricio, his children have to face issues that go back many years. The slow but well-acted script reveals the difficult life of practicing Jews in contemporary Buenos Aires. At the end, the problems faced by this Jewish family—a fragile economy, loss of traditional family values, and the difficulties of caring for the elders in a fast-paced modern society—are shown to resemble those of gentile Argentine families. Two outstanding characters are Luciana and Santiago, cousins who together produce a plan to make their relatives gather in the ancestral home. Unfortunately, like other characters in the film, their personal stories are not well developed; viewers may end of wishing that at least one of the several story lines was resolved. Recommended as a secondary item for collections of contemporary films from Argentina.

The phrase "Why is this night different from all other nights?" Is part of say a prayer for the children of Passover Seder. It questioned the children, without ever obtaining a response on the meaning of the Passover meal, different from other days of the year. According to the interpretation of my old Haggadah, the importance of this prayer is that "For the believer, no questions, while for non-believer, there is no answer." Apparently the question is whether it is still possible to believe, and especially what to believe. "

Totally Awesome (2006 TV Movie)

Do you really that stupid that they were in the 80s?

[1/10 · 25 December 2008]

If this was the average youth in the USA 80 years is not surprising that the situation in that country has become. As much character comedy that has no less a reflection of the increasing stupidity of the student that one day should manage the destiny of that nation. Poorly educated, boastfulness, violent, mocking the weakest and the poorest ... I can not believe, no kidding, that people were so student, but now seeing in 2008 as mortgage banks has deceived the people and have been able to elect the president more stupid, pointless and bloody history does not I think to think that something that exists. Unfortunately, a dishonest movie, a filth, rubbish, to which should not have access to children 60 years or only highly trained people and never, never, no way was seen by the young of this age is more dangerous than a rude movie sex hard, since it is aimed as a missile to attitudes that are being formed.

Asylum (IV) (2008)

A good film for the mentally retarded

[1/10 · 17 December 2008]

Can you make a film as bad as this? This is a film made by vacuous brain for the mentally retarded with an open mind. A film without consistency, without history, in which characters are fake, some comic situations pretending to fear. A movie that replaces the dialogue non-existent by noises to which most unpleasant and not come to story. A film bad, bad, bad to save credits and little else. Please no more movies like this which is a catalog of what imperfect, a manual of what not to do in the movies.Could be a few teenagers in college so stupid, drug addicts, mentally retarded, with so many traumas fools? If this is so poor and poor college students. But is there anyone who will explore thinking about the future? It seems that the only thing important is the alcohol, marijuana and sex and little else. Poor teenagers who have to be better this movie whose name they can give you is that is bullshit about the size of a piano.

En marge des jours (2007 TV Movie)

Can this beautiful romance be picked up where it left off?

[8/10 · 16 October 2008]

Julie, a 40-something mother, lives alone with her son. Claude has two children. He is married but in the process of getting divorced. When they meet during a business trip, it is love at first sight. Julie and Claude soon decide to set up home together, far from Paris in a new house which they have chosen together. However, soon after moving in events take an unexpected turn. Claude is the victim of a terrible car accident which leaves him in a coma. His ex-wife Sandrine attempts to take advantage of the situation to try and win him back and even to eradicate the very existence of Julie, who has to fight hard to get back the man she loves. But will their love be strong enough to overcome such a challenge? Can this beautiful romance be picked up where it left off, with Claude no longer being himself?

Una estrella y dos cafés (2006)

Innocence as liberating desire

[8/10 · 8 September 2007]

Gastón Pauls is Carlos, an architect in Purmamarca, an isolated town located in the north of Argentina. Its mission is to construct a group of cabins and in his way it runs into with the small Estela (the actress nonprofessional Marina Vilte): one wakes up adolescent of the place with which a friendship begins. "You speak little to be Buenosairean", says the girl to him to Carlos. "And you speak much to be jujean", responds melancholic the personage to him of Pauls: a man separating of its Spanish woman (Ariadna Gil) and who uses the formidable landscape of Purmamarca and the kindness of the girl to cure wounded. But when the history takes his true dimension is when the young Estela falls in love with Carlos, to that it has invited to take a pair coffees and when, lost in the immensity of a salt mine, single at night, Carlos teaches the name to him of some constellations in a starred sky. Into the body of the girl the love of the woman bursts in. The ambiguity of Carlos is perceivable when her wife appears in the town. Will complete the foreseeable dream to love the young innocent or will follow the suffered woman to Buenos Aires whose love no longer produces to him to please? "Una estrella y dos cafés" (A star and two coffees) are a simple and luminous history and that follows two personages without which to tell much but by far that to feel.

Agua con sal (2005)

Fight to survive

[8/10 · 6 September 2007]

Olga (Yoima Valdés) is a Cuban young person who arrived at Spain with a scholarship for his studies, thinking that this was better going to be the beginning of a life. After the time she is an illegal immigrant who undergoes the ups and downs of the marginalization, she cannot return to house and she must look for the life. Mari Jo (Leyre Berrocal) is a Valencian young person of the High Shore, been born in a full family of problems and which the destiny has marked its life. They are illegal workers of a furniture factory in which they receive two euros per hour. "Agua con sal" (Water with salt) is a history of women who fight to survive in this society of well-being and great opportunities, in which they look for desperately what there are lost.

El penalti más largo del mundo (2005)

A quarter's hero

[8/10 · 27 August 2007]

Fernando (Fernando Tejero) is a loser. A gray type, without ambition, that works like bookcases distributor in a supermarket of the quarter. In his free short whiles, he is substitute keeper of a football team of third regional one. In all the season a single minute has not played nor. But the last Sunday of the league the referee indicates penalty and the titular keeper injures itself. Fernando must occupy goal for the first time. If for penalty, the equipment of the district will proclaim champion and raise of category. If no, all the effort of a year will not have been worth for anything. When penalty is on the verge of sending itself, a group of indignant fans with the referee invades the field and prevents that the party finishes. The competition committee decides that penalty must send the following Sunday, in same goal, with such players and the field closed to the public. El Penalti más largo del mundo, (The Longest Penalty Shot in the World) is exactly the history of that week of delay. Seven days which Fernando becomes a hero in the district overnight. And it obtains much more of which never it had dreamed: to be the center of all the glances, that they invite to him to eat, to drink… only must open the mouth and their desires become reality. But mainly it obtains what more it wants in the world: that Cecilia (Marta Larralde), the daughter of the trainer, gives an opportunity him to leave with her.

La vida mancha (2003)

The older brother

[7/10 · 22 August 2007]

With this new so suggestive title, "La vida mancha", ("The life stains"), the been born in Bilbao (Basque Country) Enrique Urbizu and his daily history to us on impossible loves, brotherly encounters which they leave track, relations, economic marriages in danger, jams and other miseries of the day to day, that of a great city runs in a working-class district. Fito (Juan Sanz) is a young truck driver of somewhat robust ways, an extroverted, affectionate boy and something immature, that is married with the attractive and comprehensive Juana (Zay Nuba), used like administrative in an office of the INEM, who spends long time solo while his husband is of route in the highway. Fito and Juana are enamored and are parents of a boy, the monetary Jon (Sandro Polo), but problems that drag because of the concealed compulsive gambling of Fito - that gambles its wage letters begin to make an impression on the familiar situation, not thus in their relation. The appearance of Pedro (Jose Coronado), the brother of Fito on the part of mother, whom the young person did not see years ago, will change the course of its lives. Pedro is the opposed pole of Fito: a man solitary, distinguished, surely of itself, reserved and surrounded by I pull ahead of mystery, that always has great amounts of money in its portfolio. Pedro comes from England to settle during a time in house of the marriage; he will be, in certain form, a "rescuer", a "protector", like that older brother of the one than one always he hopes that him serve of hardships, and in him will be born feelings that believed forgotten… If something is had to them to recognize Urbizu and Gaztambide it is that, in spite of touching thematic very exploded and to explain "unpublished modern stories to us" nothing, they invent so that their stories work with naturalness,run of pleasant form and maintain the interest of the spectator until the end. Good part of this merit - that is not little if it is valued what luck could have run he himself argument in other hands, is due to the fact of also to have surrounded by a reliable distribution, where as much the main interpreters as those secondary are used to hitting the nail on the head, breathing freshness, naturalness and, in the case of the most veteran actors, tables and professionalism. Jose Coronado continues strengthening with this work the good image of actor of weight that has come working itself in the last years - far it is already, luckily, that stage in which he gave myself to useless personages in productions also despicable; contrary to which he happened then, it seems that now its single presence in the poster already is quality assurance. Juan Sanz ("Wild"), in his first paper protagonist, contributes to nerve, grace and free, being outlined as a name to consider in the future. And the novice Zay the Nuba, perhaps less most shining of the stellar trio, develops enough good, replacing with her accurate smiles her lack of baggage. "La vida mancha"("The life stains") is a simple, next drama, but that, nevertheless, tells on some scenes of praiseworthy composition, in which glances, gestures, actions and words help to define the psychology of their personages and the relations - evident or buried that they unite them. We can breathe the almost blind admiration that feels Fito by Pedro, the emotions contained of this last one towards Juana, or the displeasure or spite disguised that they obstruct to the young wife before certain situations. These moments, at which the dramatic dimension becomes more tangible, are alternated with lucky humor descriptions - mainly on the part of the adolescent and frivolous kangaroo of Jon, the companion of Juana or the salesman poor devil of the Circle of Readers, who with small notes, apparently superfluous, help to draw to the rest of secondary characters and to fill up the contours of the protagonists. We have the sensation of which under that level and modest appearance, all whatever becomes and it is said has an aim, and that the information that is occurred to us, either at the moments summit or the likable and close moments the more, acts a as. This way, although the evolution of history is guessed predictable, is so well designed in its construction, step by step, that gains our attention and gets to become credible. But everything in "La vida mancha"("The life stains") ray next to the substitute or, at least, the high notable. In the same way which kindness and successes can be found in her, also it is forced to say that to his script still it has left some loose screws - by deficiency and that the hand at certain moments goes away to him - by excess. These insufficiencies are specially importantly in the case of the personage who interprets Jose Coronado, since the tried mystery that surrounds it is tolerated well until certain limit, but demanded something more of concretion so that the circumstances became more likely - so that nobody finds suspect whom it does not mean to what is dedicated nor in what has entertained years in the last? -. On the other hand, like Urbizu are able to create moments of tenderness and emotion, other scenes and lines of dialogue sound somewhat hollow and hiss - the one of the shaved one, for example, already very is seen and exceeded. Yet good and the less best thing, "La vida mancha"("The life stains") is one more a film than acceptable: lead, narrated well with ability and correctly interpreted, it has in his capacity to connect with the public another great trick. It is the sample of which the bad thing of some Spanish films not must so much to that they do not explain anything novel, but to that they count it bad. "La vida mancha"("The life stains") is not exceptional by its contents, but well it is related.

Elsa y Fred (2005)

It has been time to get to be young

[10/10 · 19 August 2007]

If summary treated to do, could to say that film "Elsa & Fred" counts history of two people that finds way to bear anguishes and sufferings of a whole life to hills for, in last stage of his lives, perhaps when they could think that already everything was defined, to be able to allow the luxury to enjoy in fullness of the adventure of the love. These few lines absolutely that define the argument of the film of Marcos director Carnevale - a Co-production Spanish-Argentinean, although do not need the truth, are very far from explaining or to draw a little at least what happens. In fact, the distance is infinite that separates that concise synthesis of which the film is in fact. The difference is as great as the one that separates a dense film, foreseeable and stereotyped of other than it surprises in each passage, that is let flow with harmony and overflows of freshness, philosophy and the good humor. The technical and narrative solidity of the film, the ability of Carnevale to be able to be present absenting itself, for example, when always locating the camera in the right point, without letting to him never take too much protagonism. The balance and intelligence whereupon the script compose the personages and raise the evolution of history, treating to avoid the temptation of the fall in the common places. The overwhelming work of the actors, the Spanish Manuel Alexandre and Uruguayan China Zorrilla (in of its better papers). Through these four fundamental factors, the film is allowed to rest in its external structure and to forget in this way her, generating the frame ideal so that in screen it arises what nothing has to do with the material, and everything with the cinema. Because Elsa and Fred, together, are pure chemistry and magic, and become partners of a dream that crosses the screen. They two single ones are able to defy any prejudiced spectator (who watches with suspicions that of a history of love between greater people) to than rises of their armchair and she retires of the cinema if he is able to become bored or to get annoyed although it is a minute. Perhaps the greater virtues of history that devised the producer Carnevale next to Lily Ann Martin and Marcela Guerty have to do with fierceness to approach a very repeated subject cinematographically, and with the capacity to please construct to turns in the rate and the freshness of the narration, without never losing of Vista the basic parameters of probability that do to the plot. The personage who Zorrilla incarnates skillfully is decisive so that the tape can take a way different from which perhaps could beforehand wait for-. Su Elsa it is pure energy, freedom, spontaneous, cleverness, joy to live. Their wrinkled body and a few pains are not sufficient to hide a contagious overflowed spirit of youth. Fred, however, has had routine a singsong life and. Load with himself the lost sadness of having not long ago its woman, than loved woman, loved more companion. When the chance crosses to the protagonists, because they are neighboring, Elsa is thrown upon Fred, looks for it, almost practically harasses it. It has decided to bet his cards to be able to pass it or with that quiet and honest man who so or falls to him. Each encounter, each exit, each dialogue between Elsa and Fred, does not have waste. The film is advancing and by all means, as it does, the conflicts and the dramatic load of history gain more space. Nevertheless, the luminous and fresh essence of the film stays until the end. In this it has much to do the coherence in the elections and decisions that the script for the resolution takes from the plot. The film does not have to make an effort to sweeten nor to diminish the end: simply, the closing is natural consequence of flowing previous. Elsa and Fred manage to show that the love between people of the third age is able to involve the passion, to the eroticism, the dreams. They do not need to deny its oldness to obtain it, much less to request last youth. Without falling in stereotypes, the film is maintained with solidity in the idea that never it is behind schedule for the love; as it maintains the motto that says the film, an appointment of the Spanish Pablo Picasso, "has been time to get to be young". Basically, the personages live and enjoy so much as they can of the love who can live. In this sense, the main merit of the film is the firmness with which the producer faces his boarding the treated subject. If by on all the things something Elsa and Fred obtain, that is to demonstrate and to make think that the love has own organization in the oldness: it is not an exclusive subject of the young people.

Las palabras de Vero (2005 TV Movie)

The tears of the heart are assured with the word's Vero.

[8/10 · 27 October 2006]

Vero is a girl who suffers Syndrome of Down. Its birth dramatically changes completely the existence of its family. The marriage enters a deep crisis that finishes with the death of the husband. These circumstances change to the life of Ángela mother of Vero, who fault to the girl of its misfortunes. Ángela wants to love Vero, but unconsciously something prevents it.With the passage of time, Ángela finds a job and initiates a relation with a fellow worker, which occupies almost all its time to him. For that reason, in who more affection finds the girl is in its older brother Marcos, a young ecologist. Vero feels a great one liking by the theater and acts in a group formed by diminished psychic. For it it needs to Marcos, that recite magical words to him that provide security to him. The fiancé of Marcos, Vero, obtains that the girl can participate in a assembly for which she is responsible, in a theater group that belongs to an elite school. But the training unit commander and some parents are against the participation of a girl with Syndrome of Down. Marcos and Vero are going to put all their interest and effort in surpassing these ties. LAS PALABRAS DE VERO (The word's Vero) are one of the films for television supported by RTVV, Broadcast television of Valencia, filmed in video of high resolution and with vocation to offer a quality product, for which it is had counted with a reliable distribution in which it emphasizes the presence of Pilar Andrés, the girl protagonist who, until certain point, recreates her own problem with the Syndrome of Down behind the cameras. The result is of which it does not leave indifferent. The tears of the heart are assured

La Atlántida (2005 TV Movie)

without precise horizons

[6/10 · 21 April 2006]

Victoria discovers that it has left just a short time of life and its only preoccupation is to fix the future of its adolescent son, Mauro, with which it lives in Barcelona. After many years without knowing to nothing of Salinas, his ex- husband and father of Mauro, Victoria it is put in contact with him to sell a house that they have in common, La Atlantida, in order that his son can count on a patrimony in the future. Salinas, a musical well-known that lives in this house in A Coruña, refuse to sell it.

A history where some of the dramas are mixed that have left in the society of principles of new century XXI the excesses, more or less innocent, of years 70 and 80. The consequences of the pastimes transgressors whom their terrible risks were not known that today are so near us: The hard drugs, mainly the heroin, the alcohol, the irresponsible sexual promiscuity, the "free" love, etc. and that today is reflected in the disease of the HIV and AIDS, the children had in broken pairs which they have had to grow without the necessary references of a father and an exact mother and responsibly constituted like such (children by accident), and consequently a life without precise horizons, where what counts it is the day to day.

It is not known very or if this film denounces that state of things or simply is limited to teach a picture to us without any moralizing spirit. Or it justifies them. The things are as they are and as so we accepted them and we coexisted with them inventing a new type to us of relations of which nothing we know, again, its consequences in a future in which, in spite of the final optimist, we intuited that it will not be far better that the present.

It has this film some brief paint faded ones of the use of the children who often make the mothers against the parents. The absent father is the objective of all the resentment that keeps. This way the single son receives the obsessive vision of the mother. It is truth well that in this film the attitude of the father reveals certainly egoistic and egolatra, and the mother, by that reason, will persistently try to avoid the right of the son judging by if same knowing the truth. And he will remove to the right of hatred or love to him.

Nancho Novo interprets a personage near its own reality. As Salinas also is dedicated to the composition within the world of the Rock music. Many of the songs that are interpreted in the film are of their own responsibility. He is a veteran actor to whom him lack conviction in this film. Too much to itself is interpreted. Mercè Pons, Victoria, are a very well-known Catalan actress and whom in this film it little plays a convincing role needing the due credibility before the drama that must incarnate. Too much it is contained. Although that seems to me that it is more problem of the little actoral direction that product of the interpretation. Of that same lack of credibility it undergoes the adolescent artist Manuel Lozano, Mauro, discovered for the cinema by José Luis Cuerda in his magnificent film La Lengua de las Mariposas (Butterfly Tongues). In general to the film him lack direction of actors of hand of Belén Macías that will have to be applied more in its next films if it does not want to see as their pretensions are eclipsed to make solid and credible a drama.

Lost Bullet (2007)

Misled film

[2/10 · 19 January 2006]

There are films that did not have never to be made and this is one of them. Daniel (Juanjo Puigcorbe) leaves the jail with the spirit to take revenge itself of his father-in-law, a judge sunk in the corruption and the drug trafficking. And one better idea is not happened to him than the one "to kidnap" to its own son (Jose Maria Gomez) and to take it to decrepit studies of cinema where they are rolled, still today,broken-down films of the American West staged in the Spanish Mediterranean coast with the only Yankee reference that the one that gives a withered actor him, Michael Morrison (David Carradine), in the declivity of his once shining race. Permanent sensation that is obtained in this film is the one of dust that covers it of principle to aim, that does that when it concludes, the spectator of a deep sigh of lightening. It is truth that his director, Pau Martinez, aims at many things. But it is so its unskillfulness that all of them are halfway as halfway it is left the film that seems to be without finishing. The tried revenge never concludes, the fled tried one is not carried out, the denunciation to the corruption of the corrupt father-in-law does not finish explaining, the connections of the judge with the bandits narcotics traffickers are not seen by no side, the incipient love that is born between the protagonist and the secondary actress who for of apache (Cristina Seats) has been diluted like a lump of sugar in the water, the encounter with the old friend To pound (Mercedes Sampietro)loses itself in a timid kiss that nobody knows that it means, we do not know that lesson has learned the boy, a little bad-mannered, in this unusual adventure if we excluded to shoot with an old Colt of the imaginary American West. We do not know either if the old actor is pederast or a frustrated father, logically with all the extremely well-known problems, alcohol, age, ephemeral glory, etc. And finally we remained without knowing the reason for the antagonism that feels this devastated actor by Daniel to not being deeply rooted enmity between Americans and Spaniards, nor is understood the reverence that becomes to the Empire when it is the beating whom the 'españolito'poor man at hands of the quarrelsome receives, powerful and dusty American gunman. That is to say, we remained waiting for the end of so many things whereas we shook the dust that has fallen on us, after seeing this film (?). It causes a great pain to see that handful of good actors act in a so poor film. Necessities to eat every day...

L'illa de l'holandès (2001)

Catalonian's film and Mediterranean vision

[10/10 · 17 October 2005]

Cradle in a novel of Ferrán Torrent, counts the history of a university professor, Lluís Dalmau (Pere Ponce), that, stopped by his political activity, it is deported to an island located to kilometers of the coast where a small community lives on men and women that subsists of the salt mines. We are in 1969. The first intention of the professor is to escape, but it decides to postpone its plans of flight since, little by little, it feels more fascinated by the island and the mysteries of its inhabitants. At the same time, it initiates a loving relation with an attractive farmer, Feli (Cristina Plazas), that is mother of a girl. Patrice (Feodor Atkine), nicknamed "the Belgian", maintained idyll with Feli, to that still it wants. But, persecuted by a dark past, "the Belgian" it has not been allowed to formulate plans of future with them. Sigfrid Monleón is released in the long film after one long race like critic of cinema, producer, scriptwriter and director of shorts films, writer of some books and habitual collaborator of mass media. Homónima also does adapting the novel of Ferran Torrent, that writes with him the script, published now in Castilian. 'The island of the Dutch' is a film that counts on excessive simplicity, elegance and beauty out of the times and universal subjects (the political resistance, the social mobilization, the love, sex, the nature), that take advantage of to the maximum the natural opportunities that a beautiful and calm island contributes and a novel that counts many and interesting histories. It is a film of difficult classification and explanation. It starts with the deportation of a anti-Franco dissident to a small Mediterranean island at the end of the Sixties. From parallel histories are developed there that affect of simultaneous form all the personages. The protagonist plans fled his from her arrival, but the magic and the magnetism of the citizens of the island cause that it begins to consider if is worth the trouble. It makes friendship with the alone Guardia Civil (Civil Guard) of the town that is the one in charge to watch it; it participates actively with a sector of the population, next to the mayor, who is against the urbanization of the island( paradoxical is the meeting with the speculators in the Palau of the Generalitat); it enjoys in the calm sea, the mysterious caves and interminable pure air strolls; it discovers in a wonderful woman love and calmed, romantic and pure but practically impossible sex and is interrogated continuously on an enigmatic personage of whom little they know in the island. They are many, perhaps too many, histories that open to the spectator everything a fan of personages, situations and expositions that cause the reflection. Sigfrid has rolled a tempered film, something improper of a prime opera, in which there is much of maturity and little of improvisation but in which it notices a lack of depth in the personages and relations, when trying to include so much, so that in some cases means are had left to construct. Catalonian's film in own language, is united to all those that are forming the Catalan cinema, with directors like Francesc Bellmunt, Pons Luck, Agustí Villaronga and so many others, that they contribute one mixed Iberian and Mediterranean vision that conforms another particular way to make cinema.

Noviembre (2003)

Fear to the freedom

[10/10 · 12 October 2005]

Interesting interpretation on the creative freedom. The enormous Spanish tradition of the spectacle in the street has been truncated time and time again by the successive powers that always have seen in the theater a disturbing element of the well-thinking society. It is why it has been always persecuted and prevented the free expression. More,in spite of it, always moved away groups of commercial the circuits and for that reason prostituted, that have preferred the proximity with the public, true adressee of the representations have existed, shaking the consciences to wake up them of the sleepiness collective who undergoes that customary society to the easy televising programs or truculent,violent, unreal, manipulating and cheating films of the majority and overwhelming American cinema. And to the aim the tribute that must pay that exercise of free expression in this furious world by the idea of the security, on the one hand, and the absurd terrorism that are not another thing that the two faces of the same currency. What matters is to restore the fear to the freedom. And when this it does not exist or the money does not corrupt it, it is had to shoot on the pianist.

Chasing Papi (2003)

Vergüenza Latina

[1/10 · 1 October 2005]

Nonsingle with beautiful women a film can be done, Chasing Papi is an example. The most rotten and vulgar topics meet in this discouraging history in which it recreates most shameful of those Latin ridiculous to hills of the typical tics that presumably represent them: the machismo, the hot crotch, the rate and little more. And all decorated it, in addition and to top it all, with a strange and distant language in a depressing attempt to even degrade plus the Spanish as tribute to the master who pays. One feels defenseless before so large aggression and single they are left desire to vomit later to see resemblance clown outfit. That yes, saving the beautiful physicist of those three splendids feminines protagonists. Something is something.

25 degrés en hiver (2004)

The old and the new Europe

[10/10 · 20 September 2005]

A Spanish and her descendants who are Belgian after the dictatorship of the Franco Generalissimo (the Generalissimo of the s...) threw them outside Spain, like so many others that they had to emigrate by political or economic reasons: the old Europe. The new designs of familiar relation: a father left with its daughter, a mother with its son living with a stranger... And sure also the victims, always innocent, who must adapt to the new forms. Without excluding solidarity and the love, as she could not be of another way. One persecuted Ukrainian one, without documents, hundreds of Arabs who teem by the streets of Brussels: the new Europe, possibly future racially mixed Europe flood of rich shades.That is an alive society and in growth and for that reason generating adaptation problems. In spite of the apparent chaos which is it is Life. Live, then, the diversity.