El mar

There is not much to add that won't echo what has been written here before me. This film is a brooding, creeping powerhouse of guilt and loss, brilliantly directed with intimate character-driven screenwriting that dares you to resist getting sucked into its vortex of spiritual agony. Villaronga is a genius and a true one-of-a-kind. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem likely that a US distributor will be taking the gamble on this one any time soon, so those of is in North America are at least temporarily at a loss. A British DVD is currently available with English subtitles. See this film any way you can.

Only the severely deluded will pretend that this film is great art or psychologically penetrating (although there is quite a bit of other penetration going on throughout). It is pure Spanish "Grand Guignol," beautifully photographed, strung out before us like a string of carefully spaced horror-cameo happenings.

The director found a novel that contained all this excrement and he really went ape over the possibilities of cramming it all into one movie. The first sequence involves five young children who witness a guerrilla-style execution during the Spanish Civil War, but only three of them survive the experience. Then the film jumps forward bout 15 years, and those 3 survivors JUST HAPPEN to find themselves in the same TB sanatorium. The 2 men are patients and interact with other supposed patients, all of whom look incredibly buff and healthy.

The shenanigans in the sanatorium have almost nothing to do with the events pictured earlier, but that is not surprising since nothing that happens in this movie has much relation to character or to reality. The gay sub-plots come strictly out of the blue, and aside from some nattering psycho-babble, there is nothing here relating to "the sea."

Having said all that, go ahead and enjoy the movie! It is almost a parody of Spanish melodrama, smartly staged by a wannabe Almodovar.

I went to see that movie without knowing absolutely anything and I was surprised to realise that i was seeing an unusual movie. Good interpretations, script and great direction. Maybe a little bit of less explicit blood could be made a delicious film. A detail; this film is made originally in Catalan ( a language talked in some parts of Spain ), and filmed in Mallorca (where Michael Douglas has a house). Well, the Catalan talked in this island is so different than the Catalan in Barcelona that in the cinema that i went, the dialogue was subtitled (also in Catalan) to make it understandable!!!

"El Mar" directed by Catalonian director Agusti Villarona, and based on the novel by Blai Bonet, offers a glimpse of the Spanish history as seen by a Balearic author that takes the viewer back to the days of the civil war in that country. The movie concentrates on three friends, and follows them from those early days during the onset of the war in Majorca, to a few years later as two of those friends meet again when they are at a sanatorium, lost in the countryside.

We first meet three boys that are playing happily. Not everything is what it seems. The tragic death of one of them points out about the cruelty of the one that commits the evil deed. The boys have excluded a young girl, about their age, from taking part in their games.

When we meet the adult Ramallo again, he is on his way to a sanatorium. He seems to be suffering from tuberculosis. To his surprise, Manuel Tur, one of his boyhood friends is also being treated, and the young girl that was not welcomed to participate in their games is now one of the nuns that supervise their health care. It is obvious that Tur looks at Ramallo in a way that only means he is in love with the tough bully. Their relationship will have devastating consequences.

Roger Casamajor does a good job with portraying the older Ramallo. Bruno Bergonzino makes an impression as Tur, the vulnerable youth. Antonia Torrens plays Sor Francisca with conviction. Angela Molina, puts an appearance as Carmen, the wife of the caretaker of the institution. Simon Andreu is perfect as Alcantara.

"El Mar" is a dark film that clearly shows Agusti Villarona's talents in making the novel come alive for the viewer.

Film is designed to affect the audience and this film left me speechless. Gorgeously photographed and well acted with dialog that approaches poetry the film involves lust, hate, murder, rape, theft and deception. It weaves an intense web that left me unable to take my eyes off the screen until the closing credits. The story is sweeping. It takes the audience from the atrocities of the Spanish Civil War to the human wreckage left behind. Roger Casamajor and Bruno Bertanzoni are two young actors who command the screen. Supporting players are excellently cast and lend a real sense of authenticity. Sets, lighting, scenery and cinematography are wonderful. I absolutely love the photography.