machocabrio

This is a dream cast ensemble of acting powerhouses and yet... It delivers a bland punch. There are a couple of decent action sequences at the end, and I call them decent because it seems to me everybody did some level of stunts in here. So kudos to that. But the direction is so uninspired and the story so thin, it really feels empty.

Reminds me of Atomic Blonde, another promising action-packed thriller that promised to deliver on their strong female characters and fell short of it's ambitions. It is underwhelming to have such an amazing female cast and giving them nothing to really work with. No depth to personalities, no real story and just ok action. I gave this 6 stars just because I love them so much and it's always a delight to watch them on screen.

I was told this film was a great drama about a disabled father who fell from grace and his relationship to his daughter. An exploration of the human experience. It's is nothing like that, but a load of stereotypes, a very basic story with a thirst for cartoonish cruelty, cliched bad guys with piercing eyes and stiff faces and a twist so predictable and forced its painful to watch. People cry with this because it's designed to make them feel guilty and to create a false sense of connection with characters that are in reality paper thin: the dad is just a victim, doesn't have any other virtue or depth, the little girl is cute, always a divine light in her face and a sense of forced innocence to make you go "aww", the dead girl's dad is evil, has no personality, his only trait is the way he smokes, the inmates are a pirate crew. There are no characters, only caricatures. It's a soapy drama reminiscent of The Passion of the Christ: every sour thing on screen is designed to provoke despair, sadness and repulsion, but there's just that, the story doesn't say anything, it's just a cheap ride. There's a somber character that is so mysterious and conceals so much information, you immediately know will play a key but artificial role in the big scope of the story. He's never really explored, because he's just a hidden ace for the film to deliver its final trick, which is so improbable and absurd, you feel cheated by the two hours prior to the reveal. This film is more interested in making you suffer than developing characters and creating a story with a purpose. It says nothing about the human spirit, totally devoid of significance. I really find it interesting that it holds such.a high rating on IMDB when it feels closer to a telenovela than it is to a powerful drama.

La Camarista (The Chambermaid, 2019) by mexican director Lila Avilés is a film that shows a level of freedom within the confines of a restricted budget that is just mindblowing.

If you read the rest of the reviews around here you will get a sense of the style it's shot: the camera, using beautiful cinematography, is a passive witness to a hotel chambermaid's daily routine. There is no spectacularity, not an earthquake to shatter the main character, she's never accused of stealing stuff... There's no dramatic trigger to turn this story into a powerhouse drama. Instead, Avilés chooses, wisely, to dwell on her star's nuanced but effective performance. Gabriela Cartol's Evelina (the maid in the title) is a shy, dreamy and sometimes annoying woman. A real person instead of a stereotype. We're not here to lament her poverty, but to join her daily conversations, her momentary daydreaming, her spirit breaking apart or becoming stronger.

Avilés is not interested on bringing disaster into her characters' lives. She doesn't want them to unravel, instead we're drawn into this colossal universe of a big city hotel and breaks into its small spaces and corners, revealing beauty in routine.

An overall enjoyable experience for audiences who relish subtlety, La Camarista manages to feel as a refreshing take on a cliché subject.