You're the one (una historia de entonces)

The writer/director of last years foreign film Oscar nominated THE GRANDFATHER, has done it again. Brilliant characters, marvelously acted, filled with the kind of humanity and insight so rarely seen in the cinema today. Lydia Bosch, and the music deserve special mention. This film will no doubt be nominated for this years Oscars in the foreign film category.

Veteran José Luis Garci has delivered a quiet little masterpiece here; a reminder of those beautifully photographed melodramas of the forties. The choice for black and white for the stunning photography was spot on and made it a joy to watch.

There is nothing extra special about this picture except that everything works so well. The actors are superb, the direction sound and with great feeling for the subject matter. This could so easily have become an excruciatingly sentimental tear jerker but it hasn't. It remains on the correct side of true emotion and the sometimes wry humour mirroring the hurt of the three women in the story - each in her own way coping with loss and memories - is a delight to watch.

Julia Gutiérrez Caba as the cigar smoking, wise cracking mother in law to the servant Julia is especially good. Her performance alone makes this worthwhile watching.

This movie has been elected by the Spanish Academy of Cinematography to represent Spain at the Oscar's. In fact, I think it has a lot of possibilities to win. It's one of the best pictures I've seen lately. An elegant and delicate direction, warm and sentimental dialogues, superb performances by all the entire cast... make this film remain in your memory (and in a special place of the heart) once you've seen it. The way it touched me is simply magic.

With 'You're the One' José Luis Garcionce attempts again to create a reminiscent mood piece. However, I felt that the film was lacking. The use of black and white does give it a very classic feel of a movie from the 1950s (which is clearly what the director intended if that wasn't so obvious from the numerous references) but I felt that it would have been much more effective in colour because of the landscape and surroundings that are so stunningly captured by Raúl Pérez Cubero's cinematography. The colour could have been used to add to the atmosphere. The characters are interesting but the spoken lines are clichés. The soundtrack is adequate and the performances are competent. Julia Gutiérrez Caba and Ana Fernández standout. I appreciate the subtlety and the fact that director Garcionce has steered clear of melodrama. The film itself failed to engage me as a whole. I wouldn't say that watching ''You're the One' but in the end there wasn't much that resonated.

A movie in black and white about a very simple story, about the sadness of losing a person you love with that kind of love that should be forbidden. A movie about movies, about impossible love, about fanatism, about life. A story from those times, "una historia de entonces", with a talented director at his best. Another kind of cinema, the kind of cinema only a few chosen people can do.