Km. 0

I rented this twice. I didn't get the chance to see it the first time I brought it home. Something about it nagged me, so I took again. What a truly enjoyable film. A few times I could see around the corners of the script, but many times I was pleasantly surprised. There's not as much of the Madrid scenery as I would have liked to have seen as I've never been there. But beautiful faces made up for beautiful places.

The story line where the older woman meets a male prostitute was an interesting direction, though the results were obvious. The portion about the dancer and the man he meets didn't offer enough meat to be really compelling, so I couldn't give it a 10.

Regardless of the flaws, it was just plain enjoyable. I really liked it a lot. Take this one home!

This hilarious and hip farce follows the 14 strangers of various classes, ages and sexual preferences, each of whom has a date with the other at 6 PM at Km. 0 (the exact center) of Madrid. The heat is unbearable (hint- metaphor). After a romp through the most outrageous (and comical) situations between 6 PM and the proverbial midnight hour (another metaphor), each will find the person/significant other he/she wants. This ideal companion may change (even a few times) during the course of the evening. But by midnight, Mr. or Ms. Right may not be the original date.

So, the plot's not too original...perhaps too many corny metaphors? But that only adds to the satirical appeal of this farce. Its real forte' are the ingenious situations, the linkage of the characters, and the location for absolutely screwball, sexual, and crass humor, which only a tolerant and modern Latin European capital affords. Great comedy!

Picture a romantic sex comedy as it might have been codirected by Frank Capra and Pedro Almodóvar, and you'll have a vague idea of the kind of quirky confection Serrano and Iborra have cooked up.

Iborra introduced the screening I saw in April 2001 at the Miami Gay & Lesbian Film Festival. He said he got the idea for "Km. 0" while standing in Madrid's Puerta del Sol, watching different combinations of people meet up at the plaza's famous zero-kilometer mark. This engaging, surprising, very funny and sentimental ensemble piece follows more than a dozen such characters of varying ages, professions and sexual orientations as their stories cross and separate over the course of one day.

My only gripe: the plot twist at the end seems unecessarily corny, though admittedly it's not at odds with what we saw earlier in the film. On the whole, "Km. 0" is worth seeing.

Low-budget and light, KM 0 is - nonetheless - a refreshing blend of drama and romantic comedy. Combining a sprawling Altman-size cast, a touch of Almodovar camp, and a Frank Capra sweetness, the film follows the interaction and evolving connections between 14 strangers from various backgrounds who all share a coincidental meeting place at the center of Madrid, during a highly symbolic heat wave. The varied situations they find themselves in are fairly cut-and-dried at first, but each evolves in an unusual direction, and at least a few of the characters (the younger gay man, the middle aged woman) are quite fascinating and endearing. This attention to detail elevates this charming but messy film above the usual romantic comedy, and the Capra-esquire twist near the film's end was pleasantly unexpected. With the exception of the middle-aged woman, I found the male characters to be much more well developed. The fact that a couple of the women preserve connections to men who treat them badly seemed highly unnecessary - though perhaps realistic, it didn't really work as a critique of sexual politics, and this threw a sour note into an otherwise breezy and pleasant film.

But overall there's plenty of charm here, and I found KM 0 to be mostly a treat.

This is a completely entertaining, hilariously funny, film. The story revolves around a series of coincidences and mistaken identities among an attractive group of Madrilenos of varied ages and sexual inclinations on a scorching summer day. While the plot, as such, is completely ridiculous and fairly predictible, the performances are uniformly terrific, and there are some very amusing twists and turns on the way to the foregone conclusion. Well worth seeing, much more genuinely amusing than most Hollywood attempts at romantic comedy.