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Reviews
Así (2005)
Contemporary Sensivity
Asi, is an special movie, the proposal of the 32 seconds scenes, Being part of the Intruso Movement. And for me the most important issue is the lack of dramatic elements to make a traditional on going story and instead adventuring on the real. Some other users have expressed about the movie as boring, this in certain way can be true, since once Hitchcock remarked "Making drama is, taking life as it is and cutting off the boring parts", well Jesus Mario Lozano in his proposal dos not cut them off, besides of that uses them to remark the characters life, so close to real contemporary life, that it punches you in the face.
The main problem with the movie, can be some technical aspects, mainly the sound. Due to some problems (This movie was extremely low budget) the sound had to be dubbed in its totality, and this also diminished in a great amount the acting. If you see just the on scene acting you can notice very natural acting, but if you put attention to the dialog, the sound and some intentions don't match, so this little problem makes a lot of damage.
A comment must be done on the photography, very normal in aspect very every day image on your room, but focused on the aesthetic approach to that. In general terms Asi is a good movie to try a different cinematic vision, the vision of the every day.
Zapata - El sueño del héroe (2004)
A painful shame
Being totally sincere I spected this movie to be not good, but never thought it was possible to be as terribly bad as it is.
Based (Is it?) on the life of Mexican hero Emiliano Zapata, the screenplay is a mess. This historic character was maybe the Revolution hero with more social impact, maybe also the only one with true ideals, and actions. But you can see nothing about this in this movie, Instead of that the movie uses all the time to say just that he was the "chosen one" never even trying to figure why. Too much has been said about the inclusion of the Mexican singer Alejandro Fernandez in the main role, and blaming him of all the weakness in the character. I think that this conception is really wrong, cause being not an actor Mr. Fernandez took the responsibility of his character, and studied acting, and Nahuatl (Being the only one who seems fluent in his speaking) and made a big effort that made a good shape for the hero, but even the best actor in the world would be incompetent to fill a character that in this story and screenplay, haves nothing in its soul.
The photography by renowned photographer Vittorio Storaro is really beautiful, but ruined by the editing and shameful visual effects. The Set design and costumes are great. The musical score is a full mess, and the main love theme is a perfect copy of: Don't cry for me Argentina.
Meaning all this I have said that the movie haves a lot of good effort by cast and crew, but being the leadership by Arau an empty mess, with not a hint of creativity, all this effort is a complete waste and a shame of movie.
Las lloronas (2004)
Promising Filmmakers
This movie is the first feature, produced by a duo of women in the middle of the still new panorama of film making in the north of Mexico. The movie haves some problems due to being the first attempt of young people, and cause being produced against a hard medium. I must say that the movie haves many interesting moments and each one can be admired for its own merits. The principal problem is that each of this moments very often haves nothing to do with the others, I mean the film is very inconsistent in means of its narrative. The second mayor problem is the script, cause the story even being very interesting, and complex sometimes, is told in a very confusing way (I have the theory that the editing haves to do with this) making some important points unclear for almost all the play.
The search of making art and also telling a good story is evident. Being this point the principal benefit of the movie and the filmmakers, promising a much better result in the next production.
Kusah Hakwaan (1999)
A nice journey!
When you see this movie, you will notice that is not technically brilliant, but you can see a lot of work and effort put on it. Being attached with the tagline "the first alaskan production by alaskans" one gets the idea of the difficult process of it´s production, what is worth seeing.
The film tell us two stories, one is the traditional alaskan legend of "Kusah Hakwaan" a canibal demon, and the other is the reality of the traditions of storytelling and the tlingit dialect in the actual days. The legend is a beautiful journey which explores many aspects of the human spirit as is common to these old tales. The focus on the misunderstanding of this on the new generations is a very good testimony and point of reflection.
I found in particular this movie very enjoyable, for an afternoon when you just want to get a good tale told. And very interesting for young people.