La Langue des papillons

Adapted by screenwriter Rafael Azcona from three stories in Manuel Rivas novel "Que Me Quieres, Amor", Butterfly is a rare and insightful coming-of-age story that takes place in a rural part of northern Spain during the Second Republic when Spain had a brief flirtation with socialism and democracy. Against a background of the growing clouds of the Spanish Civil War, the film depicts the relationship between asthmatic 7-year old Moncho (Manuel Lozano) and his liberal schoolteacher played by the great Spanish actor Fernando Fernan Gomez (All About my Mother, The Grandfather).

Butterfly does not directly involve politics (at least until the end) but tells its story through snapshots of young Moncho, In the beginning, he is a quiet, shy boy who is afraid go to school because he thinks his teacher, Don Gregorio, will hit him. Gregorio, however, is a kind spirit who teaches his students to appreciate poetry, the beauty of nature, and the spirit of loving one another. Moncho grows from a frightened child to an enthusiastic young boy who is eager to learn all that he can about life. He divides his time between following his older brother's exploits playing the saxophone in a local band and chasing butterflies with his teacher friend. The butterfly here seems to be a symbol both of freedom and transformation.

I felt very involved with this young boy's world and found Lozano to be one of the most beguiling child actors that I have seen in a long time. His performance alone saves the film from Miramax-type sentimentality (which it occasionally drifts towards). Gomez is also wonderful as the compassionate teacher, symbolizing the humanitarian government that Spain enjoyed before the onset of fascism.

Eventually, Moncho must choose between his love for the teacher who opened his eyes to the beauty and wonder of the natural world and the ugly pressures of his family and neighbors to take sides in the political conflict. With the ending as shocking and memorable as Truffaut's The 400 Blows, Butterfly powerfully illuminates the human cost of war.

A European import teaches us how simple and beautiful film can be. `Butterfly' or `Butterfly Tongues' (in some US markets) tells the delightful story of Moncho, a young boy's coming of age as his world opens up through the eyes of his beloved teacher, Don Gregorio. As the teacher brings the boy into the fascinating world of butterflies, the boy begins to emerge from his cocoon. But looming on the horizon is the surgence of a fascist regime that threatens to unravel their innocent world.

In the summer of 1936, which is when the films takes place, the whole of Spain was intertwined in the struggle between the Mussolini inspired Nationalist Party and the Republicans. But as the rest of Europe was being over run by a couple different fascist regimes, Spain was trying desperately to prevent that outcome. The film `Butterfly' brings in these elements and lets these two main characters deal with the impending doom and the heart-breaking aftermath. The film also beautifully depicts these simple folks who are desperately trying to find their way in the world. From one side you have the teacher who is just trying to bring peace to his students and their world. And on the other a young boy trying to understand the gigantic world around him. The teachings of the butterflies are a metaphor for the change coming in Spain and in both of their lives. This metaphor rings cleverly through each character in the film which does beg the question did the teacher know about the coming conflict and was trying to say something subtly. After watching this film, I learned the character of Don Gregorio was played by a legendary Spanish actor named Fernando Fernan Gomez. I could see even before I knew who he was that this man is amazing. I haven't seen this kind of subtle grace since Sir John Gielgud. I wish I had a teacher like him in my life. (4 of 5) So Says the Soothsayer. (Now Playing)

This one was one of the excellent movies I have seen for the last couple of years. It takes you back to 1936, Spanish War in Galicia. Telling the truth I did not know well what happened there exactly . But this movie showed how the war influenced those people who lived in a small town to live their small lives. By the time they showed the ending scene my heart ached. I truly wished that someone could have been here with me to enjoy the afterglow this time. It has not happened to me lately. Plus their way to take this film was exquisite. Every single scene was beautiful and sentimental as if you turn around the post cards stand at the souvenir shop.

In this film, we see Spain lurching toward the brink of the Spanish Civil War through the huge uncomprehending eyes of the child Moncho. The metaphor for "Butterfly" has many complex applications in this film but for me the most profound of them was the moment that Moncho's saintly teacher captures a butterfly in a net, tenderly observes it and then sets it free. If only the future of Spain had been in such sensitive hands. As the film progresses through its beautifully photographed scenes of ordinary life, the reality of the evils of Fascism and the hope of the Republicans begin to chasm the serenity of the land.

The film is not about war, it is rather, about how much personal honor people will trade for an idea of security for themselves and their families. In a way, it parallels the dilemma in the scene in Eisenstein's STRIKE in which a woman with starving children is thrown a coin by one of the factory bosses. Wonderfully executed performances in a profoundly moving film. -Rowena Silver

I've been watching a lot of films in Spanish lately, trying to prepare for a course I will be teaching on Love in Hispanic Cinema. I'm searching for the film I can show that will exemplify love of country... and while I don't think this is the one I'm looking for, it may work insofar as the "love of Spain" expressed resonates with the same propagandistic tones similar expressions of "patriotism" so often do.

I won't bore you with the basics of plot nor repeat what everyone else has already said as you can read the intro and a hand-full of other posts and know enough. I will tell you that this is a subtle film. We in the US are so used to being hit over the head by our movies that watching this film is like feeling a soft breeze. It's oh so quietly disquieting.

I have found interesting the posts reviewing this film that criticize the "meanderings" of the plot --how far the dispersed elements take us away from the core message. But I ask, what is not childhood but a collection of fascinating and disconnected pieces of a puzzle that we can't put together quite yet. Music, love, family, sex, food, school, friends, women and girls, books, nature, teachers and grown men -all equally interesting and engaging to a young boy. But when he's all of maybe seven, what does he know about how they all relate to each other? What do any of us really know about how all the pieces of our lives fit together, or what they mean?

I especially enjoyed the sad quality of all the varied losses interwoven in the greater story; they tempered the otherwise hopeful mood of the film. The overall effect on me was that I understood that loss is comprised not only of one deep cut but of a thousand little ones too. It wasn't only the dream of a Republican and free Spain that was lost; it was much more that was lost as well.

The film-making here is exquisite too, like a butterfly, so beautiful visually; "La lengua de las mariposas" is so well executed that it truly feels real. There were no moments when I said to myself "oh, come on," as I do when I feel I've been taken for too stupid to figure things out for myself, when everything has been made too obvious, predigested for me by the movie makers.

Amazingly the child actor is believable at all times -never too precocious, never too coy. An excellent performance from a child actor is always a delight. See the Argentine film "Valentin" (2002) for another.

Others write that the ending is shocking, too abrupt and that the audience is neither prepared for it nor guided towards it. For me that is the perfect ending because it replicates the shock of the civil war to the Spaniards, and the shock adult violence inflicts upon childhood. For me, the abrupt ending was the radical interruption traditional Spain forced upon everyone's future. Never mind, as one post suggested that in Republican Spain the communists had taken over and democracy was no longer in effect. Democracy here is the exotic Chinese beauty Andrés falls in love with, a fantasy out of reach, silenced and taken hostage by a brute.

See this film and decide for yourself.