Post Mortem

"Pos-Mortem" won the 2nd Coral at the 2010 Havana film Festival, as well as acting prizes for two of the protagonists. It is a slow film, certainly, but builds up public and private tensions into a state of near-hysteria: violent scenes are suddenly deconstructed with moments of black humor -- clever and believable while upturning the viewers' anxiety. The political moment, the most dire in modern Chilean history, inserted into the dailiness of a job at a general hospital autopsy lab and morgue, shows both inexplicable social tragedy and, almost horribly, how familiarity with violent death almost, almost, breeds contempt. The quiet camera and murky grey lighting allow squarish, static settings to open slowly onto their meaning and context -- individual and historical; and the somewhat unsympathetic but not unappealing protagonist shows his true alienation and self-interest in a splendidly dark, comic finale. A clever, funny film with strong reminders of how the blackest history can repeat itself.

I had recently watched this movie on "Festival International de Cine de Valdivia" (Valdivia's International Film Festival) and it was awful. The movie starts slowly with the story of Nancy Puelma (Antonia Zegers), a cabaret dancer, and Mario (Alfredo Castro). But the developing of the story doesn't catch the viewer, it doesn't have any interesting on it. The only story that was interesting, about Mario's job, doesn't get developed very well, and we only get the worst performance of Zegers ever, and a very very boring movie that doesn't deserve my time. On the Cinema that i had watched this only 2 people applauded at the end of the movie. It was like "What the hell!!... Why i'm watching this? This movie doesn't have any sense". There's a lot of new chilean movies that are way better than this movie. I'm NOT a follower of a dictator (Pinochet). I believe in independent political liberal ideologies. And I simply think that there are way better Chilean movies that threats these political themes in a better way like "Machuca", "Fiesta Patria", and "Bastardos en el Paraiso". In fact, Post Mortem SUCKS.

A film that bills itself as a political drama, but is really more of an oddball art film, and succeeds at neither. I'll note that I'm actually a fan of indie/arthouse films, but this film represents the worst of that genre, being a film that is glacially-paced for no good reason, with very little plot development, and languid and unsympathetic characters that often act with no clear motivation. The stated central theme of coroners who are forced to cover for the crimes of teh regime is barely developed. The relationship between the main character and his love interest is simply pathetic and rather gross, really. I cannot believe this film won awards. There's just nothing here in terms of a passable plot, or character development, or even individually interesting scenes. Why was this film even made?

This is a great movie, but if you are accustomed to standard movies, where the story is pretty straight forward, then this is not for you. For understanding what's going on you need to know what was going on in the country in those days. The movie mixes history with black humor, with non sense and tells you important things without telling them directly. That's why I really like the movies of this Director, he is telling you something behind the scenes that's very powerful, but if you only focus yourself on the 'standard' plot then you missed the whole point. I really liked Tony Manero and this one, great movies but only if you go a step ahead, otherwise I agree that it could be nonsense, but definitely is great just for those able to understand it.

Chilean director Pablo Larrain successfully out-does his previous masterpiece 'Tony Manero'.

'Post Mortem' builds gradually but once the revolution invades the lives of Mario and Nancy the film never loses pace. It really is one for those who love mix of lavish cinematography combined with gritty realism that Chilean cinema does so and Larrain is truly becoming one of the masters of South American cinema.

It's a more mature, more European film than Manero but is all the better for it.

A tender, slow-burn masterpiece.