UnowPriceless hyped garbage

Stephan Hammond It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

Neive Bellamy Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Rosie Searle It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

runamokprods An aging, caustic (but good hearted) author has a young writer type up his autobiography, and we see his mostly Utopian childhood, the loss of his beloved father, his love affairs in his early 20s, and his relationship with his wonderful mother, the title character.All of this is set against the background of the changing, ever worsening politics of Argentina.A film I couldn't quite love, but also couldn't help but quite like.It's a little shallow for a 2:30 hour epic tale of a man's life, but it's also always interesting, and the whole thing is well acted , and has both a charm and sadness, along with characters who can sometimes be surprising. I enjoyed it more, not less on a second viewing, which makes sense since the plot isn't what's special, but the details.

damalfieri Few times in my life I have seen such an intense drama. Intense in the dialogues, superb in acting. The life as it is, not an idealized bit of it, as in conventional films. Characters are deep, well developed, they don't act the standards, but seem to be much more "human" than in conventional stories. Almost every scene is a virtuoso acting near-monologue. But you have rests, including the whole Chopin nocturne's filmed in a way that, only with the actor's expressions, something is still happening into the characters, and the story doesn't suffer for such a long quiet time. Yoy can save a lot of dialogs as a treasure. OK, it is not as much as an archetype of filming language. OK, it is nearly theater. But only nearly. I cannot imagine me enjoying all of the subtleties in actor's faces from so far, in a theater. A tasty drama, full of good philosophy about life, love and feelings, expressed trough complex characters and scenes. Too bad for those who find it "slow" or "overlong"... in my opinion, they just didn't catch it. To me is seemed pretty dense, full of things... I couldn't stick out until the end. I didn't like it. Just the last minute. But it is my opinion. All the rest is more than enough to make the movie a masterpiece. In my opinion.

casch0101 This is a beautiful film. A first-rate script, first-rate direction, first-rate photography, top-notch acting by simply everyone. This films makes you "taste" good emotional music (classical, tango and jazz), and makes you "taste" great literature since the Director throws all this into a pot and cooks a delicious real-life recipe. The base of the film is the true and deep love of a mother for his only son, who she believes has a relevant stage in history destined for him. I cannot but strongly recommend that you see this film which will keep you watching and keep you delighted throughout the 2 1/2 hours which pass so fast (than the real time) you could swear you have just discovered Einstein's relativity theory to be utterly true!

dutchtom1 After un lugar en el mundo and Martin Hache. I was very much looking forward to the new Aristarain movie. Unfortunately the weakest points for the previous here fill out an entire feature length film of a gratingly long 130 minutes. Characters have no other depth than proliferating themselves by talking about their favorite classic/jazz musicians and literary figures. They do not explain what meaning or experience they find in these. just referring to them must convince the viewer that these characters must be very intellectual. Of course the effect is that they come across as very hollow, pretentious and rather unpleasant. Thbe only character that wins the viewer's sympathy probably is Roma, Joaca's mother. Her views are fresh and yet heartwarming. Perhaps it was the intention of Aristarain to alienate the viewer from any emotional bonding with these antipathetic characters, in that case he succeeded. What is truly a structural flaw of the film, not just of taste, is the way the story is told, if one can call it a story. There are just flashbacks which do not seem to follow from one to the next. Characters suddenly take meaning to other characters without any explanation. In the end the film becomes a mess, and I could not even finish watching it. Aristarain is crossed of my list of favorite directors. I hope he'll turn the tide with a next, better, film.