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The Motorcycle Diaries (Widescreen Edition)
Release Date: 2005-02-15
Sales rank: 2533
The beauty of the South American landscape and of Gael Garcia Bernal (Y Tu Mama Tambien, Bad Education) gives The Motorcycle Diaries a charisma that is decidedly apolitical. But this portrait of the young Che Guevara (later to become a militant revolutionary) is half buddy-movie, half social commentary--and while that may seem an unholy hybrid, under the guidance of Brazillian director Walter Salles (Central Station) the movie is quietly passionate. Guevara and his friend Alberto Granado (Rodrigo de la Serna, a lusty and engaging actor) set off from Buenos Aires, hoping to circumnavigate the continent on a leaky motorcycle. They end up travelling more by foot, hitchhiking, and raft, but their experience of the land and the people affects them profoundly. No movie could affect an audience the same way, but The Motorcycle Diaries gives a soulful glimpse of an awakening social conscience, and that's worth experiencing. --Bret Fetzer |
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The Motorcycle Diaries (Full Screen Edition)
Release Date: 2005-02-15
Sales rank: 9698
The beauty of the South American landscape and of Gael Garcia Bernal (Y Tu Mama Tambien, Bad Education) gives The Motorcycle Diaries a charisma that is decidedly apolitical. But this portrait of the young Che Guevara (later to become a militant revolutionary) is half buddy-movie, half social commentary--and while that may seem an unholy hybrid, under the guidance of Brazillian director Walter Salles (Central Station) the movie is quietly passionate. Guevara and his friend Alberto Granado (Rodrigo de la Serna, a lusty and engaging actor) set off from Buenos Aires, hoping to circumnavigate the continent on a leaky motorcycle. They end up travelling more by foot, hitchhiking, and raft, but their experience of the land and the people affects them profoundly. No movie could affect an audience the same way, but The Motorcycle Diaries gives a soulful glimpse of an awakening social conscience, and that's worth experiencing. --Bret Fetzer |
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The Official Story (La historia oficial)
Release Date: 2004-11-09
Sales rank: 7630
An Argentine teacher lives in blissful ignorance of the evils perpetrated by her country's government. Over time, however, her students' rejection of the "official" versions of their history leads her to question things herself. Suspecting that her adopted daughter may have been the child of a murdered political prisoner, she attempts to unearth the truth. But her investigation reveals levels of political corruption so abhorrent that the illusions of her past life are irrevocably shattered.This is one of those rare political films that transcend politics with a stirring emotional story. Argentinean first-time director Luis Puenzo tells the story of a strong-willed teacher who tries to learn the true identity of her adopted daughter's father, coming to suspect that he was a political prisoner. Her political awakening is actually an emotional one as well because of her detached persona. Ironically, even though she is a teacher, she doesn't connect with people very well, thinking of history in the most abstract terms. But she learns the painful truth of present-day life. Tautly directed by Puenzo, The Official Story was a 1985 Oscar-winner for Best Foreign Film, with a riveting performance by Norma Aleandro. --Bill Desowitz |
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The Crime of Padre Amaro
Release Date: 2003-04-22
Sales rank: 13364
Stars Gael Garcia (Amores Perros) as the title character. He's a newly ordained priest sent to work in a small church community in Mexico by the Bishop. He arrives wide eyed and full of optimism hoping to serve God and his parish however he quickly butts heads with the elder priest in charge Father Benito. Benito is known to accept drug money from the local drug lord in order to subsidise the construction of a new hospital and in addition is carrying on an affair with a local woman. To complicate matters father Amaro soon finds himself in a love affair with the young Sunday school teacher. After a newspaper report linking the drug lords with the Church is published Father Amaro is then trying to cover up and mend the public relations fiasco. Amaro has also been asked by the Bishop to reign in the renegade priest who has affiliations with guerrilla soldiers. Needless to say moral dilemmas abound and Father Amaro's idealism is put to the test by personal political and church pressures.System Requirements:Running Time: 119 Min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: FOREIGN/LATIN Rating: R UPC: 043396004672 Manufacturer No: 00467This controversial film follows a handsome young priest, Padre Amaro (played by Gael Garcia Bernal from Y Tu Mamá También and Amores Perros), who arrives in a small town and finds himself surrounded by hypocrisy and corruption--and also finds himself tempted by a beautiful young woman who confesses that when she "touches herself," she thinks of Jesus. What makes El Crimen del Padre Amaro (The Crime of Father Amaro) particularly effective is that Amaro is no innocent--he skillfully forces a newspaper publisher to retract a scandalous story about the Church and is willing to take extreme steps to preserve his career. Some of the movie's harsher digs at the Catholic Church have provoked accusations of prejudice; but though Padre Amaro portrays a world in which no one's hands are clean, it also finds redeeming qualities in every character. A complex, completely engrossing movie. --Bret Fetzer |
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Herencia
Release Date: 2006-06-05
Sales rank: 25036
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Tango
Release Date: 1999-08-03
Sales rank: 12063
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Nine Queens
Release Date: 2002-10-01
Sales rank: 17259
Nine Queens joins a line of sly thrillers about master-pupil con artists and games within games within games that includes The Sting, House of Games, and Heist. In the first five minutes, we watch an overt scam--a young Argentinian named Juan (Gastón Pauls) running the two-10s-for-a-5 hornswoggle on a convenience store clerk--then find that we have been tricked along with the bystanders as another brand of deception kicks in. And so it goes as Juan, with both trepidation and excitement, drifts into partnership for a day with an older, more cosmopolitan conman, Marcos (Ricardo Darín). Knocking around Buenos Aires--from gritty downtown to cozy neighborhood side streets to a swank hotel where wealth murmurs behind every door--these damnably resourceful scoundrels try not to miss a bet, including an epic swindle involving the titular "Nine Queens," a set of ultrarare stamps. Writer-director Fabián Bielinsky keeps a taut rein on everything, including his own cleverness. The end result is an entertainment as bracingly disciplined as it is ingenious. --Richard T. Jameson |
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Of Love and Shadows
Release Date: 2002-10-08
Sales rank: 10516
Hot Hollywood stars Antonio Banderas (SPY KIDS) and Jennifer Connelly (A BEAUTIFUL MIND) heat up this sexy and intriguing thriller! Francisco Leal (Banderas) is an on-the-edge photographer whose work with a beautiful magazine reporter (Connelly) uncovers a government's nightmare: a secret so deadly the military will stop at nothing to eliminate them! Now, as they are thrown together into danger ... and drawn closer by passion ... they must risk everything for a chance at freedom! It's an exciting story of courage and compassion that's captivated critics and moviegoers everywhere! |
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Carandiru
Release Date: 2004-09-21
Sales rank: 28031
Acclaimed international filmmaker Hector Babenco dramatically captures the powerful intensity of this true story of hope and survival inside Brazil’s most notorious prison. Based on a true story of the day of the Carandiru massacre.The setting is grim, but Carandiru is easily one of Brazilian filmmaker Hector Babenco's most living, thriving works, with scores of powerful performances and an engaging style underscoring the cathartic power of storytelling. Based on a bestselling novel, Carandiru concerns an oncologist (Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos) who treats patients at Sao Paulo's House of Detention, a terrible place largely policed from within by longtime prisoners. The doctor is specifically interested in collecting blood samples for an HIV study, but the more prisoners open up to him, the more compassionate and committed he becomes about their survival. Babenco's episodic structure gives Carandiru a dimension of memory and constant shots of energy, so that even the most horrifying events--drug-related murder, rape, revenge--can't drive this tale into abject misery. Based on actual events, the drama's climactic police raid on the prison (a reconstruction of a 1992 riot called the Carandiru Massacre) is a tour de force. --Tom Keogh |
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Camila
Release Date: 2003-02-04
Sales rank: 18962
A wealthy young socialite and a young Jesuit priest fall in love and run away together to a small Argentinean village where they conceal their true identities. When they are discovered a terrible tragedy ensues. One of the most controversial stories in Argentina also proves to be one of its more embarrassing episodes. Authorities have suppressed the telling of this story since the first attempt to put the story on screen in 1912. This version directed by Maria Luisa Bemberg (I DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT) earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Foreign Film.Run Time: 105 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: FOREIGN/LATIN Rating: R UPC: 736899041823 Manufacturer No: DV67874 |
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