Rating: 
Summary: A Ride Through South American Political Melodrama
Review: INVESTIGATOR Agustin Rejas (Javier Bardem) has been given the task of tracking down the elusive "Presidente Ezequiel" who
is heading a revolution against the government. The movie proceeds at a slow pace yet the scenes where the rebels make their presence known are gripping with dead dogs hanging from lampposts, child suicide bombers and teenage bombshell gunners.
With each passing scene we feel the deeply rooted passion behind the separatist movement and we are led to believe...
Read more at Candela Magazine online.
Rating:
Summary: atmospheric thriller
Review: Javier Bardem is a detective leading a squad of cops in an unnamed Latin American country. His team is charged with catching a terrorist who is rallying the people to revolution and threatening the stability of the democratic government. The cops are afraid that the government will panic and impose martial law. Meanwhile, Bardem must deal with a growing attraction to his daughters ballet teacher. (Laura Morante)
How does one function as a cop in a place where the rule of law can vanish in an instant? That's the central question of this film, impressively directed by John Malkovich. Bardem (a very fine tightly wound performance), doesn't know whom he can trust, but is unable to articulate his inner conflict. He edges towards romance with the ballet teacher, but events catch up to them. I enjoyed the unfamiliar setting, which Malkovich uses like a native, and the mood of impending chaos that pervades much of the film. Some plot turns feel a bit hurried, but this is a very assured effort from all hands. The final scene is one of the most moving endings to a film I've ever seen. Recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: Good performances but very slow movie
Review: Javier Bardem is an excellent actor. Films like "Jamon Jamon", "Los huevos de oro" and "Before Night Falls" are must see movies for his performance. But I have to criticise his English. He speak so bad that some times you don't understand what he is saying.
And most of the time I imagine that he make an incredible effort to speak that affect his performance.
For the movie that occur in an imaginary place with imaginary people I can say that John Malkovich with this debut promise a great future as a director. The film is real as well as the performances, not like most of the Americans detective's movies.
In general it was worth watching but you have to be prepared because is very slow.
I only recommend for futures releases that let the people speak their native language and put subtitles, it won't kill anyone.
Rating: 
Summary: See this film
Review: John Malkovich's directorial debut is one of the best films I saw this year. A superb screenplay by fellow first-timer Nicholas Shakespeare (adapting his own novel) with a marvellously sophisticated central character is only the starting point. As you might expect, performance is foregrounded here and Malkovich gets stunning turns from his cast - Javier Bardem, in particular, is heart-breakingly good as the morally-fraught lawyer/detective - and Malkovich clearly knows how to set up his shots. This doesn't look like the directorial debut of an actor who loves the stage. It looks like the work of a born filmmaker who knows precisely what he wants and how to get it. But the real triumph of this film is that it tells a story combining action, romance and political intrigue, without for an instant feeling like the childish Hollywood pap which usually results from that recipe. This is mature, sophisticated storytelling that doesn't treat its audience like popcorn-guzzling idiots looking to be entertained. And yet it does entertain. It maintains a poignancy entirely appropriate to its subject matter, while still managing to be an engaging political thriller. That's quite an achievement. One of the most effective elements of this film is the music, or rather the lack of it. There are, from memory, only three moments when music is used in this film - and its magical every time. It makes you realise how music is usually so over-used as a cheap way of wringing emotion from badly written or badly acted scenes, and how much more REAL the tension and violence and romance can seem without it. It also shows you how effective music can be when used sparingly. The two songs Malkovich chose for this film are beautiful in their own right, yet their deployment is nothing short of spine-tingling. Overall, this a brilliant piece of filmmaking that deserves a place in everyone's DVD collection. Of course there's no soundtrack, so if you want the two songs go grab yourself a copy of Yul Anderson's album "Wind Starlight" for his stunning version of 'All Along the Watchtower', and Nina Simone's "Emergency Ward / It Is Finished / Black Gold" or "Nina Simone Anthology" for 'Who Knows Where the Time Goes?'. Both are available through Amazon.
Rating: 
Summary: Good effort
Review: Malkovich made a worthy effort to carry this movie to the promised land but the script is the ship that allows you to reach the goal and this is the fault of this movie.
The script lacks the dramatic continuity , you feel the ravishing presence of Javier Bardem , but a good cast doesn't garantee you a good result.
The narrative web which supports the drama is fragile , and obviously the film results predictable at the end. Laura Morante makes a good work .
Stunning visual locations.
Rating:
Summary: Perfect, and Timely, Entertainment for the Thinking Viewer
Review: Many viewers simply didn't *get* this movie.These are the folks who called it slow, too restrained, confusing. For the thinking viewer, this movie is not slow, and it is not confusing. It is a visual feast that leaves the mind, and soul, reeling; it is a puzzle that stays unfinished just long enough to make its points, and then closes with a heartbreakingly poignant finale. It is a tightly plotted, emotionally moving film that can be taken on several levels: as a political thriller, as a police procedural, as a meditation on the pleasures of domestic life v. extramarital passion. Most powerfully, though, this film talks about, and parallels, explosions -- the explosions of art, of politics, of terrorism, and of passion -- v. restraint. The restraint, for example, of a good man trying to live a decent life in a broken world. It's hard to talk about this film's most brilliant moments without giving away the whole plot, and that you don't want to do, because this movie's surprises are well worth it. But one can say -- watch how Malkovich uses the color red. Watch how he uses bars, as if the bars of a cage, when shooting Javier Bardem. Notice parallels, including in a scene where a young girl dances before a series of reflecting mirrors. Note the music she dances to. Notice who is the sole person ever to have photographed a certain elusive terrorist. Note references to Kant, most famous for his "Critique of Pure Reason." No, this film is no art house puzzle. But it does offer more than the pure pleasure and visual excitement of a nail biting political thriller, which it offers as well. It offers us food for thought about one of the biggest issues of the day -- terrorism. Is it ever right, this film asks, to give in to one's momentary passion and explode, either literally or metaphorically, when confronted with a variety of stimuli, from finding the love of your life, even if you're married to someone else, to having your coffee plantation seized by government troops? And, what kind of person has something in common with a terrorist, anyway? The answer the film offers might surprise you. I loved this movie. I wish more of my fellow viewers had gotten it. This film, in addition to being simply beautiful and entertaining, sets before us some of the biggest questions of the day. Finally, Bardem's performance, a masterpiece of restrained passion and thought, is not to be missed. Malkovich hit the bullseye.
Rating:
Summary: "The government uses human fat to lubricate its machines."
Review: Nicholas Shakespeare, who wrote the screenplay of his novel, establishes in the opening scene the conflict between the "common man" and the government in an unnamed Latin American country. Three adults, driving in their truck through the barren countryside, run down a soldier who tries to stop them at a checkpoint. At a later checkpoint, they indicate that the bloodstains on the car are from a dead dog. This imagery is further developed throughout the film--common people vs. authorized government, blood and the color red, and dead dogs, a symbol for those condemned to death.
Capt. Augustin Rejas (Javier Bardem), a lawyer turned policeman, is investigating a series of mysterious hangings of dogs, with signs affixed to their bodies, praising the mysterious Ezequiel, who may be inciting the countryside to a Maoist revolution. In further violence, dancers at an avant-garde performance kill a government official and his wife; a child blows himself up, killing more officials; and three mayors, eleven city councilors, and the Minister of the Interior are assassinated. Rejas, an honest man, struggles to investigate as the corrupt military, controlled by an equally corrupt president, threatens to impose military rule.
Directed by John Malkovich, the film is impressionistic, giving the audience fragments of the ongoing action but not a coherent picture, requiring the viewer to draw conclusions, just as Rejas and his assistants do, in an effort to solve the terrorist mystery. Since the dialogue is not always clear and the accents are strong, this is sometimes a difficult task. The cinematography (Jose Luis Alcaine), however, is dramatic and memorable, much of it focusing on architectural features--bridges, arches, jail cell bars, the bars of a fire escape, columns, balconies. The color red (symbolizing blood throughout) is used to powerful effect in virtually all the key scenes.
Though Bardem and the rest of the Latin American cast are effective in conveying the tension of time and place, the film is sometimes difficult to follow, and the exact nature of the relationships is not always clear. Nevertheless, the film makes its point about the nature of government and political movements and succeeds in showing Rejas (Bardem) as a rounded character, trying to keep his family happy, trying to find happiness himself, and trying to bring honor to his job. The music is sparse but used effectively and sometimes symbolically, especially at the beginning of the film, where happy, syncopated accordian music is gradually transformed into dark, eerie harmonies, the syncopation kept intact. Thoughtful and complex, the film highlights some of the competing interests of Third World governments. Mary Whipple
Rating: 
Summary: Confusing story with much too many unresolved details
Review: On the surface, this is the kind of film I usually like. It's set in an unnamed South American country. It's about terrorism. And it has all the off-beat twists and turns to be expected in an independent film. And, by the way, it's directed by John Malkovich. The story is about a policeman, played by Javier Bardem. He's such a good guy that he even gave up his practice of law because he hated the corruption. He's also a member of an indigenous Indian people and, in a scene or two, he speaks the native tongue to show how "ethnic" he is. Considering the fact that he's a dedicated and non-corrupt police officer, he lives a pretty good life. His wife is a bit of an airhead, dresses in the latest fashions and wants to have plastic surgery done on her nose. His daughter takes ballet classes. The terrorists start doing bad things. Children with terrorist fervor blow themselves up in crowded marketplaces. Dogs are murdered and strung up on lampposts. Everyone is frightened and martial law takes over. And then our hero starts an affair with his daughter's ballet teacher. Why did this film have to be in English? And why are there so many unresolved details? And, most of all, why did I keep falling asleep? Sorry folks, I just didn't like this film. And I can't recommend it at all.
Rating:
Summary: A superb film
Review: that has me waiting for more from Malkovich and more from Javier Bardem. My only complaint is that the music, though very effective, is so loud that it drowns out much of the dialogue -- something I find happening more and more with recent films.
Rating:
Summary: Intelligent and subtle film debut for John Malkovich
Review: THE DANCER UPSTAIRS is a fine example of how films conceived and produced by this country can have all the qualities we honor (and hunger for) in foreign films. Based on true events in the late 1980's in Peru, THE DANCER UPSTAIRS is adapted for the screen from the novel by the same name by the author - Nicholas Shakespeare. The story itself is one of extremes in terror, murder, heinous crimes, and all that is associated with terroist activities in a revolutionary framework. Yet Shakespeare has written a screenplay that focuses more on minds of his characters than on their acts. The 'revolutionary' is a professor of philosophy and his nemesis, tracing his identity and capture, is a thinking man's policeman - a lawyer who turned in his black robes to find a better way to discover honesty. Although Malkovich does not spare images that convey the atrocities (children as suicide bombers, slaughtered dogs hanging from the street lamps, mafia-style executions), he does not dwell on them but rather focuses on the impact on the mind of his lead detective. Javier Bardem is the lead actor here and surpasses his previous successes by demonstrating that he is a 'work in progress' - an actor who grows with every difficult assignment he encounters. His sidekick is well acted by Juan Diego Botto, an actor who knows the subtlties of 'supporting role'. The lead women actors, Laura Morente(as the dancer of the title) and Alexandra Lancastre (as Bardem's wife), are as subtle as they are beautiful, making us believe in the inevitable proof of Bardem's human frailty as he forges his imperturable trail toward justice. The accompanying featurettes are involving conversations and commentaries by Nicholas Shakespeare (who actually lived in Lima, Peru while the 'Shining Path' revolution he describes actually was taking place), by John Malkovich regarding his choices of electing to cast his film with an entirely Spanish speaking crew yet speaking in English and for not naming the country or the particular timeframe of the story which he hopes will make the story more a parable than a docudrama, and by Javier Bardem who addresses the difficulties of keeping his character cerebral. And for once these features truly enhance the film's message. It is refreshing to know that movies of this caliber exist and that, hopefully, Malkovich will continue his brave stance as a director of consummate taste and subtlety. Highly Recommended, but be prepared to think.
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