Director Lucho Bender's feature debut and Argentina's Academy Awards entry is a very accomplished, heartfelt ensemble comedy-drama that takes place on Christmas Eve, an occasion that is not a very happy one for most of the characters. A boxoffice hit on the home front, "Felicidades" was welcomed enthusiastically by the Nortel Palm Springs International Film Festival audience in its U.S. premiere and rates as a viable contender for a nomination.
The title means "Happy Holidays", but from opening sequences, there is not much joy in the lives of three mature Buenos Aires men in separate, eventually convergent story lines. A lonely writer (Luis Machin) at a festive bar mitzvah gathering has his heartstrings tugged by an equally lonely, very pretty young woman. But she leaves before he can introduce himself.
Longing to see his girlfriend, the writer hitches a ride with the hired comedian (Carlos Belloso) of the evening, and they soon take a wrong turn on the way back to Buenos Aires. When they run out of gas, the writer goes in search of a gas station, ends up wandering through a nearly deserted power plant and eventually winds up in the back of a truck with a group of Bolivian musicians.
In Buenos Aires, meanwhile, the writer's girlfriend (Silke) is pursued on the festive streets by a doctor (co-writer Pablo Cedron) who carries a shoe box with mysterious contents. But before they meet in her apartment, he helps a wheelchair-bound paraplegic (Marcelo Mazzarello) get to his fifth-floor apartment in a building with no elevator. The doctor lingers and performs more acts of charity for the needy but upbeat man. Later, when the doctor disastrously helps cause the death of a pet dog, he tries to cover it up with funny/sad complications.
The third main character is a dentist (Gaston Pauls) whose search for a particular toy as a Christmas present randomly inserts him and an ailing old man (Federico Cammarota) in a police investigation as witnesses. The investigation entails the cynical policemen (Cacho Castagna, Eduardo Ayala) breaking into a criminal's abandoned apartment and stealing everything of value with the help of a "fat neighbor" (Alfredo Casero).
Utilizing nonactors in several roles and basing many of the episodes on real-life stories, Bender and cinematographer Daniel Sotelo beautifully evoke an almost endless night of limbo, where sadness and disappointment are not magically revoked, but life is made bearable, and hope is not close to being extinguished.
FELICIDADES
Bendercine
Director: Lucho Bender
Screenwriters: Pablo Cedron, Pedro Loeb, Lucho Bender
Executive producer: Cecilia Hecht
Cinematographer: Daniel Sotelo
Art director: Patricia Pernia
Editors: Silvina Soto, Lucho Bender
Music: Daniel Tarrab, Andres Goldstein
Color/stereo
Cast:
Doctor: Pablo Cedron
Dentist: Gaston Pauls
Woman with dog: Silke
Writer: Luis Machin
Comedian: Carlos Belloso
Paraplegic: Marcelo Mazzarello
Running time -- 97 minutes
No MPAA rating...
The title means "Happy Holidays", but from opening sequences, there is not much joy in the lives of three mature Buenos Aires men in separate, eventually convergent story lines. A lonely writer (Luis Machin) at a festive bar mitzvah gathering has his heartstrings tugged by an equally lonely, very pretty young woman. But she leaves before he can introduce himself.
Longing to see his girlfriend, the writer hitches a ride with the hired comedian (Carlos Belloso) of the evening, and they soon take a wrong turn on the way back to Buenos Aires. When they run out of gas, the writer goes in search of a gas station, ends up wandering through a nearly deserted power plant and eventually winds up in the back of a truck with a group of Bolivian musicians.
In Buenos Aires, meanwhile, the writer's girlfriend (Silke) is pursued on the festive streets by a doctor (co-writer Pablo Cedron) who carries a shoe box with mysterious contents. But before they meet in her apartment, he helps a wheelchair-bound paraplegic (Marcelo Mazzarello) get to his fifth-floor apartment in a building with no elevator. The doctor lingers and performs more acts of charity for the needy but upbeat man. Later, when the doctor disastrously helps cause the death of a pet dog, he tries to cover it up with funny/sad complications.
The third main character is a dentist (Gaston Pauls) whose search for a particular toy as a Christmas present randomly inserts him and an ailing old man (Federico Cammarota) in a police investigation as witnesses. The investigation entails the cynical policemen (Cacho Castagna, Eduardo Ayala) breaking into a criminal's abandoned apartment and stealing everything of value with the help of a "fat neighbor" (Alfredo Casero).
Utilizing nonactors in several roles and basing many of the episodes on real-life stories, Bender and cinematographer Daniel Sotelo beautifully evoke an almost endless night of limbo, where sadness and disappointment are not magically revoked, but life is made bearable, and hope is not close to being extinguished.
FELICIDADES
Bendercine
Director: Lucho Bender
Screenwriters: Pablo Cedron, Pedro Loeb, Lucho Bender
Executive producer: Cecilia Hecht
Cinematographer: Daniel Sotelo
Art director: Patricia Pernia
Editors: Silvina Soto, Lucho Bender
Music: Daniel Tarrab, Andres Goldstein
Color/stereo
Cast:
Doctor: Pablo Cedron
Dentist: Gaston Pauls
Woman with dog: Silke
Writer: Luis Machin
Comedian: Carlos Belloso
Paraplegic: Marcelo Mazzarello
Running time -- 97 minutes
No MPAA rating...
- 1/18/2001
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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