broken embraces review
11 years ago. Copyright © Fandango. Like Oscar Wilde's famous cigarette, it is a perfect type of pleasure which leaves one not unsatisfied exactly but with a feeling that its substance has vanished into the air like smoke. Online reviewers have written 659 reviews, giving Broken Embraces (2009) an average rating of 73%. Broken Embraces seems to be a typical Almadovar film - which is very good, to say the least. A writer in Madrid telling the audience that he used to be a film director who wrote his movies under the pseudonym “Harry Caine”. Why is Mateo blind? Read full review While its self referencing love of cinema is a feast for any cinephile, I can't help but feel that the film ultimately just runs out of gas. So much for a film that tries too hard to be original. Film Review - Broken Embraces November 19, 2009. BROKEN EMBRACES is a Spanish melodrama about passion and tragedy. Like Oscar Wilde's famous cigarette, it is a perfect type of pleasure which leaves one not unsatisfied exactly but with a feeling that its substance has vanished into the air like smoke. Broken Embraces is a cool, melancholic movie, only occasionally funny, and highly erotic in a rather chilly manner. Indeed, Broken Embraces mirrors our own - but brightly. The characters develop so incredibly well and the blending of all the stories is so striking to watch. Since her star-making turn in Volver, Cruz has evolved into a great actress, whose films the audience longs to return to: she and Almodóvar have created whole and complete worlds. Fate, though, took his sight and the love of his life, Lena (Penelope Cruz) in “Broken Embraces.” For Broken Embraces, however, the heat seems to have cooled.If Volver was the peak of the Almodovar/Cruz collaboration, then Broken Embraces is the beginning of the descent down the other side of the mountain. Now that he’s become blind, he has taken on the persona of his alter-ego, Harry. With Broken Embraces, he certainly does not disappoint, it still has that classic Almodóvar magic, with sexual exploration and magnified emotion playing a big role. He hears news of the death of Ernesto Martel, a controversial Chilean financier who bankrolled his last movie as a director, and flashbacks take us to this heady period in the 1990s when in return for the plutocrat's lavish funding, Mateo cast Martel's mistress in the lead role, and had a passionate affair with her. Broken Embraces was released in 2009 and has generally received positive reviews. Sensual and stylish, BROKEN EMBRACES showcases Cruz’s many gifts, both physical and professional. Penélope Cruz and Lluís Homar star in Pedro Almodóvar's 'Broken Embraces' Sony Pictures Classics By Joe Morgenstern. Film, Comedy. But behind the style is disappointing substance, a melodramatic story that's as old as Hollywood. Broken Embraces is not a bad movie. Meanwhile Martel, played with tailored elegance by José Luis Gómez, orders his moody son to spy on the couple with his videocamera under the pretence of preparing a "making of" documentary. Whereas Nine is inconsequential, miscast and littered with forgettable songs, Broken Embraces is neatly lined with unabashed melodrama, lush camerawork and narrative suspense. If the "mature" period of Almodóvar's career is levelling out, it is still producing intensely intelligent and watchable films, although observers are entitled to notice that Almodóvar is keen to stress the sexual attractiveness and prowess of older men. 4 out of 5 stars. and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes and Fandango. In fact, at times, it's a good movie. Quite the contrary, it is a perfectly respectabl, solid effort. Movie Review - Almodovar's 'Broken Embraces' - The Very Picture Of Romance Brace yourself: Things are about to get meta. There is enough material here, from the rich textual interplay to Penélope Cruz’s reliable vivaciousness (and sweet boobs), to warrant several viewings. Broken Embraces is clearly the better film. While I'm not sure it rests in the top percentile of his work, it's a daring, … Street 3/16/10 Sony Pictures Drama Box Office $4.7 million $28.96 DVD, $34.95 Blu-ray Rated ‘R’ for sexual content, language and some drug material. A lavish, noirish melodrama sparkling with Pedro Almodovar’s trademark humour, Broken Embraces - the director’s eagerly awaited 17th feature - … In the way of so many Almodóvar films, Broken Embraces is built on a system of dual narrative with father/son and gay/straight opposites. And what happened to Lena herself? Pedro Almodovar's latest … "Don't smile …" gasps the ecstatic director, "… the wig is false enough!". ; HD): Broken Embraces' reel of deleted scenes features three distinct sets of footage, and first among them is a failed attempt by a figure in Mateo's past to reconnect with him. The plot slowly unravels itself in a way that would make Hitchcock proud. Robin's Review: B. Harry Caine (Lluis Homar) is blind, a screenwriter and not whom he seems to be. Some say Broken Embraces pays homage to Hitchcock and to be sure there is here, when it comes to romance and desire, a shared sense of danger and intrigue, as well as an eye-popping colour scheme seemingly gleaned from Vertigo. "Broken Embraces" Review : I have heard Pedro Almodovar described as an acquired taste. "Broken Embraces" is a voluptuary of a film, drunk on primary colors, caressing Penelope Cruz, using the devices of a Hitchcock to distract us with surfaces while the sinister uncoils beneath. Share; Tweet; T he employment of façades is a key motif in Broken Embraces, and an unintentionally apt one at that, given that Pedro Almodóvar’s latest encases its old-hat tropes under a superficially stunning veneer. It's an embrace I want to submit to. Review: Broken Embraces. With his usual excellent cast, and of-late muse Penelope … Broken Embraces. and the Terms and Policies, A melodrama painted in the saffron-and-turmeric hues of a Bollywood musical, Broken Embraces is the Spanish filmmaker's homage to Hitchcock's "Vertigo," that moody account of obsessional love and double lives. With Broken Embraces, Almodovar's fifth collaboration with muse Penelope Cruz, he paints a cinematic portrait simultaneously as delicate as a flower yet as excruciatingly painful as a dagger piercing the heart. And I was very delighted to see all the "call backs" to "Women On The Verge" in this film. The stakes are higher with Broken Embraces, coming hot on the heels of the sensational Volver (2006, $85.5m worldwide) and boasting Almodovar’s biggest budget to date at $15m. It tells the story (within a … Especially in the first hour, his lifting of the lid off each new Petrushka doll gives palpable pleasure to the audience. After the movie is over and the trance has lifted, it is difficult to recall just what was so entrancing or even what the film was about. Playing an unhappily married actress portraying an Audrey Hepburn -like waif in the movie within this Spanish-language movie, she’s able to access a gamut of expressions with a tilt of her head and an upturn of her mouth. Broken Embraces: movie review ( - ) ( Monitor Movie Guide ) Almodóvar and Cruz turn to noir in ‘Broken Embraces,’ a film within a film that draws on movie greats. Mirror's Image: Pedro Almodovar's Broken Embraces Review Robert Barry , August 26th, 2009 09:48 Almodovar's latest is a slick and seductive film about filmmaking. Review. The sheer, gorgeous style of Broken Embraces is what is so seductive; with his cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto, Almodóvar conjures a vivid, rich palette of colours, which have the texture of something by Alfred Hitchcock or Douglas Sirk, but his handling of the material is so confident and distinctive that it goes beyond pastiche. Mirror's Image: Pedro Almodovar's Broken Embraces Review Robert Barry , August 26th, 2009 09:48 Almodovar's latest is a slick and seductive film about filmmaking. Broken Embraces hardly finds Almodóvar in quite that territory; but it is now not unthinkable that such territory lies in wait. Recommended. Two figures, for instance, writhe beneath a form-flattering sheet in a … It is shot in a way that you not only are watching one Almodovar film but two as there … The film has received generally positive reviews by critics; review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported that 81% of critics gave the film a positive rating, based on 152 reviews. Lluís Homar plays a blind screenwriter in present-day Madrid with the assumed name "Harry Caine"; while still sighted, he was once a distinguished movie director working under his real name, Mateo Blanco. Superbly done. Broken Embraces (15) Pedro Almodovar's longest film is also among his least memorable. And with his editor, José Salcedo, he moves back and forth between the past and the present with a miraculous fluidity, and these seamless transitions are what induce the film's pleasurably dizzy, woozy quality, a subtle molestation of the audience's inner ear. By. It marks a continuation of his infatuation with (a) bold primary colours and (b) Penelope Cruz. He uses his typical ways of directing, which have by now become his trademark. Robert Barry wonders if this latest Penelope Cruz vehicle sees the legendary director building on past greatness or … Pedro Almodóvar reunites with Penélope Cruz for a … Published. But behind the style is disappointing substance, a melodramatic story that's as old as Hollywood. In another life, when he could still see, he was known as Mateo Blanco, a filmmaker of some repute. Broken Embraces is a well-written story of a love so precious it hurt. 'Broken Embraces' is a really, really great little movie. Pundits have complained that Broken Embraces just retreads the director's old ideas; I see it more as variations on a theme – familiar, but still engrossing. Don't have an account? BROKEN EMBRACES tells the story of 50-ish Mateo (Lluis Omar), once a popular film director but now a screenwriter in the dark, a man obsessed with a doomed film project made 14 years earlier. on. The thoroughly strange "Restaurant without a View" is a drastically different take on Mateo's birthday dinner, one that awkwardly enables his only friends to experience something … Overall, cinema-goers and film critics broadly agree on the merits of the movie, with critics giving it an average score of 75% and users giving an average score of 74%. The rest of the movie reveals how Harry became blind. Part film noir, part anthology film, part Douglas Sirk-like melodrama; it's Pedro Almodóvar and his muse Penélope Cruz firing on all cylinders. Broken Embraces (DVD Review) 15 Mar, 2010 By: Mike Clark. Nick Schager. Review by Peter Canavese Released: (2009) For some time, Spanish director Pedro Almodovar has been on a winning streak, his handsome and comfortably budgeted films garnering critical praise and strong box-office from the art-house crowd. Please enter your email address and we will email you a new password. The scattered story takes some time to come together, but like all Almodóvar films, it coalesces quite neatly. It currently holds a score of 76 (generally favorable reviews) on Metacritic. Pedro Almodovar reteams with Penelope Cruz, and you have your review right there. "Broken Embraces" marks Almodovar's first self homage, moving from the overwrought melodramas of Douglas Sirk to the equally over-the-top telenovella style of "Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown", quoted here as a film within a film. And I was very delighted to see all the "call backs" to "Women On The Verge" in this film. Robert Barry wonders if this latest Penelope Cruz vehicle sees the legendary director building on past greatness or merely cannibalising his own work. "Broken Embraces" marks Almodovar's first self homage, moving from the overwrought melodramas of Douglas Sirk to the equally over-the-top telenovella style of "Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown", quoted here as a film within a film. As I mentioned in my review of Bad Education, Almodovar films, like those of many internationally respected directors, are judged by different standards. For his 17th film, Pedro Almodovar doesn’t exactly break new ground with “Broken Embraces,” instead fine tuning his gifts and decadent cinematic appetites to a satisfying routine. Indeed, Almodovar is a cinematic taste who truly must be acquired by anyone who professes a true love for magnificent cinema. Stars Penélope Cruz, Lluis Homar, Bianca Portillo. The sheer, gorgeous style of Broken Embraces is what is so seductive; with his cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto, Almodóvar conjures a vivid, … In another life, when he could still see, he was known as Mateo Blanco, a filmmaker of some repute. Being neither fantasy nor realism, but a cerebral intertwining of the two, the finished product is a truly engrossing cinematic masterpiece. The streak continues with "Broken Embraces," though with less force. Cinema as a profession of faith. From his signature "primary colors" sets to outright re-enactments of certain scenes in "Women", it was great acting and a lot of fun. Cruz delivers a role with wit and elegance, but there's a vacuum sapping the energy she tries to offer. The film centers around a filmmaker who falls in love with an actress who is the producer’s mistress. Review: Broken Embraces. Playing an unhappily married actress portraying an Audrey Hepburn-like waif in the movie within this Spanish-language movie, she’s able to access a gamut of expressions with a tilt of her head and an upturn of her mouth. Um dos piores trabalhos de Almodóvar, aqui totalmente entregue à auto-indulgência, ao melodrama barato e às caricaturas (o que não é novidade), mas sem a sensibilidade costumeira que normalmente contrabalança seus excessos. Its consensus states "Pedro Almodóvar's fourth film with Penélope Cruz isn't his finest work, but he brings his signature visual brilliance to this noirish tale, and the cast turns in some first-class performances." Quite the contrary, it is a perfectly respectabl, solid effort. This is Ray, a sulky gay man played by Rubén Ochandiano, looking in the 90s like someone David Walliams might portray in a TV comedy called Little Spain. Broken Embraces Review. As I mentioned in my review of Bad Education, Almodovar films, like those of many internationally respected directors, are judged by different standards. Broken Embraces is certainly moody, and that's one of its charms. Continues the director's streak of reliably elegant, original works, making the case, once again, that there are few other European directors working today who can match his particular blend of thought-provoking, artful, yet wholly accessible cinema. That is not to say that it is a bad film. Chica… By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy September 21, 2009. Almodovar, it seems, is one of the few directors working today capable of such extremes without resorting to unnecessary histrionics. Though the film offers nothing new for the eyes, its wordiness ultimately acts as a complement rather than a drawback to Almodóvar's masterful storytelling. P edro Almodóvar’s Broken Embraces is a lush, deeply romantic noir dense with nods to films past, yet it plays as if it sprung fully formed from the director’s unconscious. Broken Embraces is a sometimes distant film that gains immediacy from Almodóvar’s supremely confident visual style and the rush of its stories inside stories. The older I get, the more cine-literate and the more modulating dramas that I've personally encountered, the more richly I experience and cherish within Almodovar's delightfully vivacious, deeply affirming and quintessentially melodramatic cinema. The movie confesses its obsession upfront. BROKEN EMBRACES is a Spanish melodrama about passion and tragedy. The sensual pleasures of Pedro Almodóvar's lush new meta-melodrama are the more intense for being fleeting. Broken Embraces moves us with flashes of real beauty. Broken Embraces (DVD Review) 15 Mar, 2010 By: Mike Clark. For Broken Embraces, however, the heat seems to have cooled.If Volver was the peak of the Almodovar/Cruz collaboration, then Broken Embraces is the beginning of the descent down the other side of the mountain. Almodóvar and Cruz fail to engage this time around. Penelope Cruz dazzles in Pedro Almodovar's latest lusty melodrama. But somehow, instead of setting up house in our memory it departs quickly and lightly when it is done. The entire third act is anticlimactic and forgettable, and one has to wonder why Mr. Almodóvar has to let his penchant for melodrama ruin a well executed noir. That is not to say that it is a bad film. “Broken Embraces’’ is drunk on its divinely sexy and sinister compositions. Robin's Review: B. Harry Caine (Lluis Homar) is blind, a screenwriter and not whom he seems to be. In much the same way it is difficult to describe a Hitchcock film without giving away too much of the film, the same is true for Almodovar. 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