Privates Lives

One word, WOW! This movie has been bumped up to my #1 favorite movie. I watch many international and spanish films. I enjoy them more than American films because they are so unpredictable and unexplainable like the movie "Pierdas Verdes." After all Spanish movies I am left breathless and wondersome. Nothing has ever been this extraordinary. This movie is very powerful and goes where no other movies dares to go. I was in awwh throughout this whole film. Scene after scene you are simply amazed. Vidas Privadas has an excellent storyline, the actors, like Cecilia Roth (All About My Mother), and Gael Garcia Bernal (Amores Perros), are brillant. You can't go wrong with this movie by Fito Paez a legendary Argentine musician.

Okay, this might not be the best of all Latin American movies, and it certainly doesn't have the most plausible of all plots (much has been said about it already). But, let's be honest about this: I appreciate every opportunity to see the acting of Cecilia Roth and Gael Garcia Bernal, and here they are both brilliant. Gael, especially, as the boy-man who falls in love with the mysterious woman behind the wall, delivers a heartbreakingly vulnerable performance. To see him break down in the end when Carmen's secret is revealed, made me suffer with him. Cecilia, too, is pure gold, and her scenes together with Gael crackle with erotic tension. Carmen, who is unable to lead normal sexual relationships after the trauma of imprisonment and torture under the Argentinian dictatorship, needs other people to audibly perform sexual acts to get some satisfaction herself. She likes to listen to hired couples from an adjacent room but usually remains invisible herself. The first thing that strikes her about young Gustavo is his voice on an answer machine. Since the owner of said answer machine is a friend who runs a model agency and provides her with "performers", she chooses Gustavo to be her next visitor. First she listens to him having sex with a girl, then she wants him to come alone and read dirty novels to her. Their mutual interest grows and, eventually, the middleaged woman and the 22 year old man fall in love with each other. However, their happiness is doomed. Something they don't know about each other (or does Carmen know?) is bound to surface, and a tragedy of Greek dimensions unfolds when it does. I'm quite certain that, in the future, only hard core Gael and Cecilia fans will bother to check out this dimly lit curiosity. Count myself one of them. The DVD (Spanish with English subtitles) is not one to stumble across in your usual video store. All the more, I'm glad to own it now, and I'll certainly watch it again. To see (and hear!) Gael Garcia Bernal lie on a bed, reading erotic fiction to his invisible client, was worth the money alone

I agree with the previous review that this is very painful to watch. As a loyal Almodovar fan, I went to see this film because Cecilia Roth was in it as well as Gael Garcia Bernal who I'd seen in a couple of other films.

It was during the Miami Film Festival and Fito Paez happened to be in the audience that night. There was a huge Argentinian fan base watching that night.

What a horrible movie. My husband and I wanted to get up and leave but when we started looking around, the loyal fans gave us dirty looks and I did not want to be rude and interrupt anyone's viewing (the rows were very long and we were sitting right in the middle of our row).

This guy's idea of suspense music is a single high pitched piano note every 5 minutes (extremely annoying and it just didn't work). The story makes no sense and his attempt at creating a twist left you going "huh?".

Do not waste your time. If you want to see Cecilia Roth, get an Almodovar film and if you want to see Gael, get any other film he's been in.

PS: As soon as the movie ended, we left the theatre very very quickly.

I bought the film and couldn't wait to rip open the package and watch it. I love Bernal's acting (he comes by it naturally from his family). But the plot and dialog reminded me of some of the French films of the same genre from the '60s. I kept expecting Deneuve or Tritignant to come through the door. I couldn't watch it through to the end. I admit that I was tired and had just watched, Dot the I (much superior), so maybe I'll give another go, even if only to watch Bernal who never disappoints. This was a forced film in my opinion with a dreadful script, but maybe I should give a second chance. That sounds perhaps a bit pretentious:-) Hugh Corston Quebec City

'Vidas privadas', by first-time director Fito Paez, is the most pretentious and boring movie I have ever seen. The movie suffers from an unconvincing plot and pseudo-intellectual banter that result in a very forced and ridiculous ending. The sex and the final revelation are only there for shock value, and nothing else.

The acting is really good, but I don't think it has anything to do with Paez's direction; he just hired some really good actors. Gael García Bernal's fake Argentinean accent is awful, but he still gives a good performance. But, why didn't they just cast an actor from Argentina for that role? Some Argentinean actors are really good. I guess Fito Paez just wanted to capitalize on the Mexican actor's increasing popularity. Cecilia Roth is always great, and the movie is not a complete fiasco only because of her performance.

Also, Fito Paez is one of Agentina's best singer/songwriters, and I was hoping that, at least, the movie score would be good. But it's not. It's awful. The movie reduces the music to lame background noise that doesn't take you anywhere. Also, (trying not to give anything away) where the hell did that gun at the end came from? Did Paez just forget to explain why would one of the characters be carrying a gun? It makes no sense. Paez should not quit his day job and stick to songwriting.