Cartas a Elena

This is a beautiful and elegant movie, that makes you happy to be human and celebrates the heroic in everyday life. The fact that it is set in the sierra of northern Mexico does not detract at all from the elegance of the film, it just shows the natural beauty that most of us are not aware of.

In order to properly evaluate this gem, it has to be understood through its cultural differences or through the windows of an open heart.

The genuine kindness of some of the villagers and the ingenuity of the young boy will touch your heart. This is a film to be remembered long after it is seen. Warning: this film if for sophisticated viewers, even if it is set in the simplest of settings.

The meaning of true love, the deep, deep kind, is the theme of this basically unknown gem. Hope to see more from director Martin Barajas LLorent.

I watched this film at the Newport Beach Film Festival and wasn't sure what to expect. I was blown away by it. This gloriously photographed film tells the story of Emilio, a young boy who becomes the mailman of the town, in a time in which there are no phones or emails so the only way for people to communicate with their loved ones abroad is through letters. The film truly manages to capture the connection between parents and children and the magic feeling in receiving a letter. The music is beautifully composed and carries well with the pace of the story. With a remarkable cast Cartas a Elena is easily one of the best films Mexico has produced. I am pretty well sure this film will be recognized as something downright extraordinary.

I had not intended to write a review.

However, I've read all the others and not found one reflecting my opinion.

So I will write this. Just so you are forewarned.

This thing is awful.

It's as if it was written by seven-year-olds for seven-year-olds.

It's horribly acted.

I watched it because I wanted to see Copper Canyon. Very few shots of it and what I saw was not particularly memorable.

This is like bad American TV in the forties.

Just awful.

How have I not heard / made aware of this movie before? It's released in 2012 and thanks to Amazon Prime Video, 8 years later, it somehow came to my attention. I watched it without any prior knowledge of the plot or the ratings. I prefer it that way :-)

I have watched many movies that I enjoy and they are my favourites for their own unique reasons. And this one, well this one will forever stay in my heart. Or at least for many years to come.

Please do me a favour - if you decide to check this out - turn off your mobile phones, and watch this by yourself. or if you do want to watch this with someone else, do not talk or get interrupted until it's finished.

I just saw this film at the Rio in Overland Park, Kansas, as part of the twentieth Latin American Film Festival hosted by the Sociedad Hidalgo. I went thinking the whole story was right there in the blurb, but wanting to see the Copper Canyons. I expected a sentimental story.

I'm always offended by Stephen Spielberg's attempts to play on my emotions. I have to say, I totally bought into this one. Mexican writers have a way of making sentimentality profound. The story of elderly parents, in the beautiful isolation of the Copper Canyons, and the compassion of Teo and Emilio, the bringers of bad news from their children far way en El Norte, was very moving. It was made more so, knowing that many of the people of Mexican origin in the audience had known this experience first hand.

It's the first film by Barrajas Lloren't, who calls himself a liar, because he wants people to feel what he feels: hope in the face of a life that is 90% bad news. He talked about making the film in Chihuahua, torn apart by a war for control between narco armies, where the strength of the people is the only hope.

The strongest message for me was the relationship of parents and children. Teo says that distance is a terrible thing between people who love each other. The parents in the film were willing to absorb and bear all the pain their children sent them along with their remittances from an increasingly difficult life in Denver but held on to the dreams of happiness they had for them when they were small.

They were so willing to believe the good news Emilio brought them, because the love and hope parents have for their children never stops. On the other side, the distant children were working far from their loved ones, land and language so that they could send them money to survive.

I'm grateful to Barrajas Lloren't for his beautiful lies from the Copper Canyons of Chihuahua. I also loved hearing Teo read from Juan Rulfo and seeing his book survive the flames in his cabin. Maybe hope can survive, too.