Punto y raya

This movie it's a joy, a wonderful experience to find the craft of this essential art in a new voice like the voice of Venezuela. It's funny (really Funny), sad, but it's after all a human movie, with a very mood script. The vision of the director make you feel about the really essence of the south American people. The plot it's about a little war between Colombia and Venezuela. got a very interesting new talents (Roque Valero rules with his character of the Venezuelan soldier) Now Edgar Ramirez work in the new movie of Tony (Top Gun) Scott. A great experience thanks to this powerful movie.It's in other word: supreme. When you see this movie, you really feel the art in the screen.

I don't understand the exaggerated good critics about this film, except that a lot of people from Venezuela are understandably very excited, based on that the Venezuelan cinema is really a bit behind of what other countries are in the region.

The movie first of all is too repetitive, a lot of scenes are almost identical from each of the both leading roles, so you get the impression that it's a time filler. A time filler is also a good point, as this movie is definitely too long with 105 minutes, you will start to get tired after a while and watch on the clock.

All actors are quite bad, by exception of the venezuelan guy Edgar Ramirez, who brings in a bit of slapstick and plays the role of the venezuelan recruit "Pedro".

By the way, this is not a representative movie about the people of the region (caribean zone), it tends to ridicules them.

I cannot however agree that this was a poorly made film. Be prepared for a look at how sad it is when governments use their people to fight wars that feel so pointless. I'm no pacifist, but border disputes should be settled with the assistance of brother countries in the region in question. A Latin-American council should be formed to make cross border fighting a shameful sad memory of what we were before we learned better. It hurts me to the soul to think that even one minute of what this film supposes happens in the border between two brother countries is true. I think the film technique was very effective. The effect is that of memories not so much live action. Like many people my memories and dreams are not vividly colored. How strange it seems to me that people live in areas where the agony of unrest is simply the backdrop to daily activities. There's so much left to do in this world and so few people who are willing to stop the greed long enough to help.

I'll not comment a lot, what's to??? Stereotype characters, absolute ignorance about Colombia's reality, awful mise en scene, poor color choice, NOT funny (it supposed to be a comedy and they expect that you will laugh because some distend music it's beside the nonsense scenes), Very poor actors direction (if you see somewhere those people, I mean the interpreters, you'll know they are at least good, but seeing this so call film, it is impossible to guess it), you get tired of the music... this "comedy" has no rhythm, the only good rhythm in it, it's the rap sing in the final credits....pathetic, doesn't it? etc...etc... It has been a long time I haven't seen a movie so bad!!

PUNTO Y RAYA ('A Dot and a Line') is a touching little film from Venezuela, a movie with low budget and high aspirations that manages to explore friendship and bonding between two warring factions in a most sensitive way. Director Elia Schneider and writer Henry Herrera deserve their 2005 Oscar consideration for Best Foreign Film, Venezuela and we can hope this talented team partners for other outings. Shot with a digital camera that bleeds the color to almost black and white, the production values may at first put off the audiences used to either classy black and white movies or richly colored ones, but this slight flaw should not deter the enthusiastic craftsmanship on the part of everyone involved in making this terrific little film.

The film opens and closes with battle scenes, setting the tension that exists along the river that divides Venezuela from Colombia, two countries who not only have the innate political differences but also are involved in the internationally significant war on drugs - primarily cocaine and its many derivatives. Cheito (Roque Valero) is a young small time but smart and wily drug dealer from Caracas who is captured by the police and 'sentenced' to the Venezuelan army to patrol the border of Colombia. He has a beautiful sister Yosmar (Daniela Alvarado) whom he protects like a watchdog. Simultaneously a serious, naive, conservative young Colombian named Pedro (the hunky and very fine Edgar Ramirez), 'saving himself' for his beloved girlfriend Lutecia (Daniela Bascope), volunteers for the Colombian army to combat drugs and fight the guerrillas responsible for the drug trafficking along the border.

Through a continuing series of circumstances Cheito and Pedro are thrown together and it is Cheito's cunning and 'smarts' that keep the two men surviving - though at most time they are personally at odds. Their involvement in the drug cartels they engage and the varying sides of the two armies they dodge result in some hilarious comic bits. In their quieter moments the illiterate Pedro asks Cheito to read his letters from his Lutecia and write return correspondence - a chance for Cheito to voice his warped libidinous nature unknown to the naive Pedro. The two young men bond, survive dangerous situations, and eventually find some quirky changes in their plans for the future. The ending of the film is both sad and tender: by the time the story is over we have taken the two misfit buddies into our hearts.

Both Roque Valero and Edgar Ramirez are strong actors and manage to make credible this complex relationship that vacillates between enemy and comrade. They create a chemistry on screen that makes the movie work very well indeed. Not only is the story an entertaining one, it also gives an insight to the magnitude of the drug problems that cruelly determine lifestyles in South America. While it never preaches, it delivers strong messages for outsiders to consider. And in the end it is a very fine little film that deserves audience wide attention. Grady Harp