Visões

A film about Videla's dictatorship. Powerful for few real impressive scenes , admirable for the fair job of Emma Thompson and Antonio Banderas, precise definition of the essence of dictatorship ( Viela's case being , in some measure, reflection of an entire century expressions of terror and controll of people ).

The psychic aspect gives more bitter poetry to story and defines in proper manner the connection between couple partners.

Obvious, it is a manifesto , defining a regime's abuses .

It is a warning, in same measure, about the effects of no limits power. It is a hommage to the victims.

But, first, it is one of films for remind .

Antonio Banderas plays a theatre director whose wife (Emma Thompson) has been kidnapped by the Secret Service of Argentinian's Videla's dictatorship (1976-1983). Soon he discovers he has sort of a psychic power that allows him to predict the future, and to find out what has happened to her wife and to some of the other missing people (there were +/- 30000 missing people during Videla's dictatorship). Now I wonder: Is it necessary to introduce that paranormal stuff in a movie about Argentinian dictatorship? I mean, you got one of the most cruel and repressive dictatorships ever, and that's enough to make a shocking movie. The psychic powers, the vissions of Banderas' character detract the attention from the main line: the denunciation of that regimen led by General Videla and supported by USA Government, and the atrocities that were committed, the sistematic violation of human rights, and so... Especially when you have two well known stars in the cast, and the movie may have some international impact (which didn't have any of the argentinian movies that talked about the same issue).

Anyway, some parts of the movie perfectly portraits the lack of freedom in Argentina along those 7 years, and there are some sequences really shocking (in particular the ones at the prison where Emma Thompson's character gets imprisoned -and tortured, and raped-). Antonio Banderas and Emma Thompson play their roles with so much intensity, especially Mrs. Thompson, one of the best dramatic actresses from the last 20 years (in my opinion).

That's all. I just want to add that this kind of movies are so necessary, people need them not to forget some of the darkest passages of human history. Especially they need them there in the United States Of America, where no one knows a thing about latin-american dictatorships (most of them supported by the White House).

My rate: 7/10

Dear iggimarco, Coming from a country that has a similar past with Argentina i can say that the movie touch me deeply like you. Greece experienced its 7 years of cruel dictatorship 1967-1974. Seven long years that left too many scars.

Every now and then i will hear someone of my family talking about the suffer of those years although they rarely talk about what they've been through.

Indeed those who don't know, who are lucky (or not) enough to come from countries that never experienced that kind of horror will judge the movie based on script, lighting, acting etc. Those who know will feel the movie evoking all those feelings of deep sorrow and pain.

Movies like this should always be made. It is another way to maintain memory of the fallen alive and to make sure that...never again (as the movie tells us in the end)

Please excuse my English, now that it is my third language. I was born and raised in Argentina; I currently work in Buenos Aires at a café, until I get my bachelor degree in naval architecture. As crazy as it might sound, my grandfather disappeared in the 1970s, and never came back. Perhaps to you… this was just a movie, you can rate it as you want or give the names you like to. But I found myself dumb founded with this film, I felt the worst anguish while seeing it, and forced myself to keep on watching and to keep on remembering. I can not find words in English nor Spanish to describe how deeply this movie has gotten to me. It's been a long time since it happened, but I see most of this film as my mind portraying old stories that my grandmother used to tell me when I asked about the dad of my dad. A film where reality is described at its best and where a part of me knows that justice in this country is just a word with no meaning, it was before, and it is now. I win nothing by saying this, nor I feel better, I just thought that perhaps I should comment on the impact the movie has had on someone like me, a normal guy who studies and works in country where future has little by little lost its meaning.

Imagining Argentina (2003)

The story, and the facts behind the story, of innocent people being kidnapped, tortured, and killed in Argentina is so disturbing and emotionally draining it's hard to see this movie objectively. I wish it was a better movie, both in its construction (the filming and editing) and in the storytelling decisions (too much emphasis on empty searching, and too much torture, even after we get the point).

Cruelty needs no sympathy, and this movie gives it none. But it gives it attention, offering only a solution in perseverance and romantic love. There are lots of evocative scenes of dancing and music, of wide open countryside, and of warmly lit interiors. It paints a picture of a beautiful country with a beautiful culture, just to show how a small tilt in a great place can turn to horrors.

The final statistics of all the people "disappeared" under the Argentine dictatorship is an indictment of cruel dictators. The movie serves to remind us, and to paint the horrors, and it goes half way. I wish it had been a poetic, or raw, or inventive success as well.