Curapedi I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

Bea Swanson This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Paynbob It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

Guillelmina The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

cipriana0106 First of all, you have to be Argentinian to fully appreciate this film and understand the message. I am Argentinian and consider this film a clear critique of Argentinian society. In the UK, an equivalent would be a yuppie Knightsbridge-type couple living next to a cockney, east-end-type couple. The melancholy and excessive interest in trivial things, the approach and attitude to people considered "less" than oneself ("no es como la gente") and the reaction of the neighbour, who seems coarse and uneducated, but who is, in fact, more humane and kinder than the man we initially consider the "hero". We identify with the "hero" and then realize just how mistaken we are. I got bored in some moments and yes, it's long, but I think it's intentional so that you can feel the shift from one character to the other, the annoyance the "hero" feels and his flawed but very common relationship with his wife. I personally loved this film and will never forget it, but then again, I am Argentinian.

Leftbanker This would have been brilliant as a 20 minute short but as a feature it is entirely too minimalist. It went even longer than most features (1:43:00); talk about beating a dead horse. For a movie with very little to say to go 13 minutes longer than the average feature is simply unpardonable. There were some nice touches to the film but whatever statement he was trying to make seemed hardly worth this much effort. It had a few good laughs but there was a lot more squirming in your seat as you want to fast-forward to the end. I'm having a hard time fulfilling the IMDb guideline of writing at least 10 lines, and I'm rarely short for words. Oh well, the movie served as an educational tool to aid me in understanding Argentine Spanish.

jotix100 The opening sequence of this Argentine film sets the tone for what will be the central idea behind this black comedy. Set in La Plata, in Buenos Aires province, the action takes place in the famous Casa Curuchet, which was designed by that master of architecture, Le Corbusier, his only work in South America. The house with its modern lines, is more of a museum than a place one can call home.A somewhat prominent furniture designer, Leonardo, is presently living in Casa Curuchet. He has recently won great accolades for his unique design of a chair. He is sleeping when we first see him with his wife Anna. There is a noise that does not let him sleep peacefully. Going to inspect where it is coming from, he watches as a big hole is being made in the property across from his living area which is only separated by an inner courtyard. Leonardo is not too nice to this worker, who is just following orders.One day, Leonardo, gets to meet his neighbor across the courtyard. He is Victor, a bear of a man, who explains to his neighbor all he wants is some sunshine in that part of his house which does not get any light. Leonardo is completely taken aback. In his line of work, he appears to be the one ordering everyone around. How dare this man invade his territory? Victor is an adversary that will keep working to get what he wants, in spite of what Leonardo tries to do to get him to abandon his folly. Leonardo's home life, like the sterile interiors of his home, is not exactly a happy environment. He belongs to a sophisticated class of overachiever that looks down on people that are of different social classes, something that Victor represents. The conflict between the two men will go to ridiculous extremes with an unexpected finale in which Leonardo will show his true colors in a turn of events that shows well what this designer is really like.The film was directed by Gaston Duprat and Mariano Cohn. The film's main theme is prejudice as shown by a selfish Leonardo, who cannot tolerate things to get out of his control. Victor, of a different social status, shows he can deal with things in a different manner, that of the streets, more than of intelligence. It is basically a feature to showcase the talents of the two principals who give all they have to make this one of the most original films from Argentina, in recent memory. The film serves as a social commentary about class and power in the country.Rafael Spregelburg makes a formidable Leonardo. He is the selfish man that wants things his way and in his own terms. What he considers his privilege, is suddenly challenged by his would be neighbor in a conflict Leonardo thinks he shall prevail because of his position and standing. Daniel Araoz matches his co-star in amazing ways. He is a more sympathetic individual with different aesthetics, a simpler man without the hangups of his neighbor. Both actors are terrific.The directors did their own cinematography which highlights the famous home in La Plata in all its functionality and starkness. The music is credited to Sergio Pangaro. The screenplay is by Andres Duprat. This is an inspired work that shows the talent of two men in great form.

Chris Knipp This fourth collaboration between Argentinians Mariano Cohn and Gastón Duprat is a drolly ironic study of bourgeois insecurity in which the viewer's sympathies gradually shift from the apparent protagonist to his apparent enemy -- a crude neighbor who shatters his calm by knocking out a hole in a wall facing and adjoining his especially perfect house.All focus is on Leonardo (Rafael Spregelburd), a successful designer who lives with his wife and teenage daughter in the university town of La Plata, Buenos Aires in what is essentially a museum: a Le Corbusier house, the only one in Latin America. It's a real house: it's called the Curutchet House. It is ample and meandering; we never get a look at all of it at once. One of its windows faces a white wall. That wall belongs to a house. Behind that wall, in an apartment, is a macho, gravel-voiced used car salesman called Victor (Daniel Aráoz). This man is remodeling, and he wants a bit of light. The film begins with a big sledge hammer knocking a hole in the wall.At first one's sympathies are with Leonardo, especially if one has ever had to deal with nosy, intrusive, or annoying neighbors, as many of us have. Victor could be doing anything, chopping down a tree, building or destroying a fence, even harboring a noisy dog.The sly part comes when the personalities of Leonardo and Victor are combined; because, try as he might to keep it cold and businesslike, Leonardo can't stop Victor from being friendly and insisting they discuss the issue "as friends" in a café. Sure, Victor is a bit crude, and this is, typically for an Argentinian film, largely about class. But the class Leonardo increasingly shows, as the picture builds up, is world class priggishness and Olympic grade cowardice. His self-importance is endless, but nothing he does ever justifies it. Sure, he is a successful designer, but the house only underlines the fact that he's no Le Corbusier. Moreover, he keeps telling Victor he's terribly busy when he's so rattled by the noise (as Victor has the window changed back and forth) that he isn't doing anything. His wife is always on his case, and his daughter is always dancing in her room wearing headphones. Leonardo is even cowardly in the face of his daughter's insolence and and hostility. The Le Corbusier house may be marvelous. People are constantly coming around to photograph it and annoying Leonardo by even sometimes asking to be let in (out of the question; but their repeated appearances add to the growing sense of menace, of the crumbling of Leonardo's world). Leonardo resents that the house is listed on Wikipedia (it is; look it up). Victor acts friendly, and so Leonardo pretends to act friendly too, meanwhile making fun of Victor and exclaiming at his presumption and gaucherie to sycophantic friends.Leonardo began by telling Victor what he's doing was illegal. In fact when he finally consults with a knowledgeable friend it turns out Victor has the right to put in a window. It just needs to be higher up and narrower. But if the law forbids a big squarish wall, when it comes down to actual cases that may be hard to enforce. Too weak to confront Victor on his own or in a café (though he does consent to enter his kitschy van), Leonardo resorts to pretending it's his wife who won't allow the window, and then his father-in-law, who in his lies are far more authoritative and unyielding than he is. It becomes increasingly clear that Leonardo is ineffectual. The hole in the wall was from the start the symbol of his impotence.Leonardo is an asshole; and so are his wife and daughter. He's also hollow, like the family who inhabiting the modern house of Jacques Tati's Mon Oncle. With all due respect to Le Corbusier, such houses are not cozy, and in both cases people are making things more important than people. Victor (ironically, since he quite lacks Hulot's fey delicacy) is like Monsieur Hulot. He's a human being, and the threat he poses to Leonardo is that he connects on a human level. Leonardo is just a self-important snob. His sense of superiority is focused in his notion that his house is of transcendent importance; that the world belongs to him.As Victor, Daniel Aráoz's performance is a marvel of control that hovers perpetually and tantalizingly between bonhomie and menace. And the modulation of the film is equally subtle in the way it gradually shifts the viewer's sympathies from Leonardo to his annoying neighbor; the way little by little, Leonardo and his family become the truly and deeply annoying ones.The Man Next Door is a very simple story: the premise takes such good care of itself that almost any little incident that happens from day to day enriches the situation and adds layers to its implications. This is the story of a process, a gradual meltdown. Victor turns out, in a surprise twist, that, unfortunately, takes the film into another, unrelated genre, to be in fact a very good neighbor indeed. What's good about The Man Next Door is the way it's simultaneously both symbolic (and satirical) and very practical and down-to-earth.The film (El homre de al lado) has a special cool, flat, grayish look that is elegant and distinctive, and it won the cinematography prize at Sundance. It was in several festivals; is scheduled for release in Argentina in September 2010; and was chosen to be part of the New Directors/New Films series of the Film Society of Lincoln Center and shown at the Walter Reade Theater and at MoMA, March 31, 2010 (MoMA) and April 1 (Walter Reade).