Coup de coeur

When I went to see this movie I didn't expect much of it, but I was wrong. What we have here is a very good Francis Coppola's reinvention of a musical made in 1982. A beautifully filmed and well acted romantic film with wonderful music score and songs from Tom Waits, who was then nominated for Oscars in the Best Song category for this picture. "One from the Heart" was entirely filmed on Coppola's Zoetrope Studios, what brings to memory great movies of the Hollywood Studio Era. It really contributes perfectly to create "dreamy" mood of the film, it feels like a dream wondering through studio night Las Vegas probably as false as the real Las Vegas itself. And on this background we have a very simple and sweet romantic story of a love crisis in a relationship of a simple American couple wonderfully played by Terri Garr and Frederic Forrest. Perhaps it´s a kind of movie that you either love or hate. I loved it. 9/10

"One from the Heart" is the story of two kindred spirits that have to get through a separation just to find out that they belong to each other. I'm sure that many of you have had similar experiences, don't you? It is also a celebration of the Broadway performances, and of the old school cinema, when everything was hand-made. In the background we hear the voices of Tom Waits and Cristal Gayle singing and narrating what we're watching in the screen (or what we're going to watch...) on a jazz or a blues beat.

They made a huge work of edition here and the photography is just awesome (it's no surprise, anyway, for it was Vicente Storaro the one who photographed it).

As for the cast, Terri Garr's performance is just awesome and she looks so sexy (too bad she wasted her talent in second rate comedies), and the eyes of Nastassja Kinski are the most beautiful you'll ever see.

Viva Las Vegas!!! My rate: 7/10

I have never been in the United States, least of all in New York. But through some directors' works I have built up an image of the city that never sleeps that's made of jazz, petty crooks and gangsters, Godard-lovers, intellectual wanna-be socialite... For all I know, New York is what can be seen through the eyes of Woody Allen, Martin Scorsese... and Francis Ford Coppola.

I would pretty much compare ONE FROM THE HEART to Allen's MANHATTAN, in the sense that both are new-yorkers visions of romance and beauty, filtered through a broadway theatrical and glamorous sensibility. This film, however, unlike MANHATTAN, isn't about New York. It's about spining through the spotlights of a city that parties all night long (cabarets, jazz, dance and magical flirts), only to realize that in the end, it's going to be your simple significant other waiting for you in the backstage.

The staging of the whole movie helps a lot, in the sense that's it's all filmed in studio. Magical skies and dawns that make it easy to pass from a store-window directly to a sunset in Bora-Bora; lust and life and music in what I would consider the last great musical. Every once in a while, Coppola gives us a glimpse of his more passionate side. This would then be the sunny side of the melancholic DRACULA.

Add to the magical staging the nightly cabaret-like musical score by Tom Waits and Crystal Gayle and one can't help but be amazed with it all. And I thought I was surprised by Woody Allen's EVERYONE SAYS I LOVE YOU.

If this is the way new-yorkers see life, that's the city I want to live in.

Maybe this isn't a masterpiece, but this Las Vegas musical shot entirely on a soundstage was wildly underrated. The film is as daring as any of Coppola's other works. With enjoyable performances and the great Tom Waits/Crystal Gayle songs, slick camera work and colorful neon, there was no reason for this film to get kicked as hard as it did. Who know, maybe it is a masterpiece.

I have to start by saying that I've had this film on videotape for so long and have seen it so many times that I believe the tape must be damaged by now. I'm a huge fan of Francis Ford Coppola's films, not only his "Godfather" films, but also what he has produced in the 80's and 90's. "One from the Heart" stands as one of most beautiful and poetic art pieces I've seen, ever. He created an entire world on set, something that resembles Vegas, but that I feel, extends a bit beyond that, someplace where love does exist (and Frederic Forrest and Terri Garr are great, because they do represent the average man and woman that want to surpass their mediocrity and have the dream, represented by the late Raul Julia and the gorgeous Nastassja Kinski). The beautiful score by Tom Waits, and the entire dance acts are so wonderfully entwined, that it's impossible not to feel the taste of real cinema there. The cinematography is stunning and I can only sum this up by saying that this film is an incredible experience to watch. Please do so.