Les lois de la famille

This is an amazing movie. It describes the perfect lifestyle of an Argentinian man/family/relationships. It may sound weird that my comment is so different from the previous one, but if you want to know how a middle-class family is, this is an incredible portrait from it. Daniel Hendler and Julieta Diaz are two of the best young actors we have and they mix up with well-known actors as Adriana Aizemberg. It it a must see; it's funny, sad and moving. If you're not Argentinian you may not get all of it OR you may appreciate our ways in different aspects of life. If you go deeper and you want to know something more that your own country, don't miss the chance and see it.

I found the film quite disappointing. I felt the film lacks focus and intensity and the script is quite flat, almost a soap opera. The film is described (and accordingly so named) as the struggle of Ariel Perlman (Daniel Hendler) a Law professor addressed as 'Doctor Perlman', to realize his own identity from his father, 'Doctor Perlman', an established, sharp Buenos Aires lawyer. Unfortunately the movie has no real focus on this, nor on other aspects of Ariel's life (we see a bit about his role as a teacher, a bit about his family life as husband and father, a bit about his social life, and a bit about his relationship to his father, but no strong story or drama links all this together).

In particular I am not too excited to see this movie as the Argentinean candidate for the Foreign Language Oscar nominations for 2006, as I think it will not compete well with high quality submissions such as 'Water'.

Daniel Hendler is a splendid actor. Subtle, without any mannerism, he construct his personages with truth. Daniel Burman make movies about subjects he deeply know. More truth. Real life in movies works a lot (that's my opinion...). Argentinian cinema pay attention to his adult public, producing films with a deep perception of actual problems of relationship in family, work, school etc. Every social class is represented in his movies, and all kinds of problems too. Some authors (like Burman, Campanella, Subiela and others) have his trademarks not only on subjects, but in style and approach. Is a great moment for the Argentinean cinema. Family Law is a simple and direct film, but involves the audience as only great movies do. A little masterpiece.

Even the great cinema masters, including Bergman, Kurosawa and Fellini, reached a point where rehashing the same old stories in new containers became old and boring... Too bad that a promising young Argentine director has reached such a place in so few years. What a boring, mindless movie... What a lack of story, what a lack of feelings(and the lack of feelings was no purposefully described).. how little to say None of the characters has been developed; we can't and don't care much for anybody... maybe the best actor, or at least the one with whom we can connect is the 2 or 3 yrs old child... otherwise, the movie is fairly boring... cute in a vacuous sense. I hate to do this: not worthwhile to go to the movies... nor rent.

Most modern Argentine movies are of dark, sad topics. This one is not quite a comedy, but not melodramatic either. Instead it is a pleasant film about family relationships. Father and son are attorneys in Buenos Aires but the son has never worked with his dad, although the father's office had a room for him. Instead he is a creative university professor of law, and meets his future wife there. When the son becomes a father himself, he takes stock of his life and realizes there is more to it than work. The movie is entertaining, but simple, and well acted. It hasn't yet been released in the US, but I saw it in Buenos Aires and English subtitles were available on the DVD.