This first part of Ernesto Guevara biopic can be watched on its own. In fact, having watched also the second part, I must confess I had rather stopped with the first installment.
Ernesto Guevara led a very intense and adventurous life. There is an excellent film about his formative years (The motorcycle diaries) which details how Guevara got to know about the miseries of the South American continent and decided to do something to re-dress the injustice.
In this movie we lack any information about the idealistic background that moved Guevara. The style is very documentary-like and detached. In fact, even too detached. The main part of film is in colour, showing Guevara reaching Cuba in 1956 with Fidel Castro and the other revolutionaries and fighting their way to Havana. Also in colour is a short flashback in Mexico, with Guevara and Castro meeting the first time.
Interspersed in the movie are grainy, black & white scenes about Guevara 1964 trip to the UN. These scenes are very annoying for those who watch the film in the original version (in Spanish), and understand both English and Spanish. Guevara is interviewed in English, all questions are translated in English and he answers in Spanish, making the whole process unbearably dull.
Sadly, also the long guerrilla part of the movie is equally unexciting. Obviously, even guerrilla fighters must have some dull moments in their life, but here it looks like they have nothing else. Given the documentary-style, we are shown countless scenes of the long march through the island, the most (and only) dramatic moment being the taking of Santa Clara.
Considering the events depicted the major political overturning and the years of fighting spent by Guevara and his companions, the result is sorely lacking drama and tension. Benicio Del Toro does a good job, playing the part without any fanatic idealism, but rather with a human, melancholic side. Unfortunately he is not enough to make the movie raise from fake documentary into compelling biopic Disappointing.
P.S. big mistake morphing what is perhaps the most famous photo of Guevara into a quasi-resemblance with Del Toro...
Ernesto Guevara led a very intense and adventurous life. There is an excellent film about his formative years (The motorcycle diaries) which details how Guevara got to know about the miseries of the South American continent and decided to do something to re-dress the injustice.
In this movie we lack any information about the idealistic background that moved Guevara. The style is very documentary-like and detached. In fact, even too detached. The main part of film is in colour, showing Guevara reaching Cuba in 1956 with Fidel Castro and the other revolutionaries and fighting their way to Havana. Also in colour is a short flashback in Mexico, with Guevara and Castro meeting the first time.
Interspersed in the movie are grainy, black & white scenes about Guevara 1964 trip to the UN. These scenes are very annoying for those who watch the film in the original version (in Spanish), and understand both English and Spanish. Guevara is interviewed in English, all questions are translated in English and he answers in Spanish, making the whole process unbearably dull.
Sadly, also the long guerrilla part of the movie is equally unexciting. Obviously, even guerrilla fighters must have some dull moments in their life, but here it looks like they have nothing else. Given the documentary-style, we are shown countless scenes of the long march through the island, the most (and only) dramatic moment being the taking of Santa Clara.
Considering the events depicted the major political overturning and the years of fighting spent by Guevara and his companions, the result is sorely lacking drama and tension. Benicio Del Toro does a good job, playing the part without any fanatic idealism, but rather with a human, melancholic side. Unfortunately he is not enough to make the movie raise from fake documentary into compelling biopic Disappointing.
P.S. big mistake morphing what is perhaps the most famous photo of Guevara into a quasi-resemblance with Del Toro...