Ardor

Set in the Argentinean rain forest this is part western and part eco tale. It stars one of my favourite actors Gael García Bernal, as Kai, and he also co produced it. We have a poor subsistence farming family who are targeted by nasty thugs working for a land grab company – we are never sure what their ultimate aim is.

Kai ends up going to rescue the abducted daughter of one of the farmers but in so doing puts himself on a collision course with the evil ones.

Now this has a few clichés in it and has borrowed heavily from other films in the western genre. The action is limited, but when it happens it is well done. The cinematography is lovely – but hard to go wrong when you have the bounty of a rain forest at your feet– probably. The performances are all above average too but where it falls down is the thin story line. It is good versus bad with next to no ambiguity at all and almost no back story – this makes it hard to put everything into context.

That said I still enjoyed the watch – but would not want to see again, so a rental option here methinks. Original title is 'El Ardor' and filmed in Spanish with good to average sub titles and a run time of 96m minutes; this is one for those that like the sides nice and firmly drawn and appreciate some good old fashioned retribution.

While it is not obvious in the beginning inside the jungle on Misiones near triple frontier with a jaguar roaming nearby, it is increasingly clear as this Argentine-Brazilian movie on land conflict advances, particularly in its second half, that it is a Western. Not only due the script, with powerful and violent gangsters robbing a rural estate from a humble hardworking family, a mysterious stranger engaging himself in protecting it against them, defensive shooting strategy, rape and duel. Also in edition, cinematography and even costumes (although the story is not in XIXth century in the United States, but in contemporary or recent past in verdant and watery Northeastern Argentina), the film explores many traits of the genre, with large face close-ups, shotguns, neckwear and wide-brimmed hats. The movie is technically well made, with extraordinary actors such as Chico Diaz, Alice Braga and Gael García Bernal.

This movie is a mess! It takes from so many past films and creates a film which is clinch ridden. The main character is a mixture of Tom Sawyer (Look Ma, no shoes!), Tarzan (he speaks to tigers), Rambo (jungle warfare expert who uses nature to defeat well-armed opponents) and Clint Eastwood in The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly (starring and squinting). The bad guys are stereotypes of characters right out of Deliverence, The Road, and Rolling Thunder. The story plot is so stupid that it is really hard to believe; a gang of killers who are working for an unnamed boss, attempt to steal land composing of two wooden shacks in the dense jungle with no one around for miles. The hero keeps removing his shirt,yet wears a hippie style leather necklace and has a strange looking tattoo on his back which looks like an ocean wave. Also, ninety percent of the dialogue consists if heavy breathing and moaning. All the characters are flat and stiff. There is no chemistry what so ever between any of them. They just like and stare, and wear filthy dirty clothes and never shower. This movie is a real stinker. I only gave it a four because the photography is beautiful and I liked the stupid showdown at the end.

Kai, a mysterious man, emerges from the Amazon rain forest near a remote tobacco farm whose owner is being threatened by armed men working for those who wish to take the land for soya farming. Shortly afterwards three of these men turn up and kill the farmer and take his daughter, Vania, with then. Kai follows them back into the jungle and manages to rescue Vania... they know the men won't stop though and prepare to face them back at the farm.

I had little idea of what to expect with this film; I didn't even know what genre it was... it is closest to being a western with its theme of people being threatened in order that other more powerful people might take their land. There are also ecological themes. The story is simple with a fairly minimal amount of dialogue. It looks great even if it is a bit slow to get going. Once the action starts it is exciting and leads to a finale that is both thrilling and atmospheric as heroes and villains face each other in a smoke covered farm. The cast are solid; notably Gael Garcia Bernal and Alice Braga as Kai and Vania; the villains might be a bit one dimensional but that isn't much of a problem. The jungle setting looks great, as one would expect. Overall I'd say this might not be a great film but it is decent and worth watching if you like westerns and are looking for something rather different.

These comments are based on watching the film in Spanish with English subtitles.

As my title says, it could have been better. I was looking for a western and I had the impression that this was a western, not! I do appreciate the subtitles but there was not enough dialogue to carry the story and flesh out the plot. I am a devoted fan of westerns, independent westerns, and westerns set in other counties and this may have been called a "modern" western but it does not rise to that either. I recognized Alice Braga since she is one of the stars of Queen Of The South. I can see a great effort was made and the production values were good but I can't say more than that. Better luck next time.