Even the Rain

[3.0 stars] [IMDB Link]

[Amazon Link]
(paid link)

Netflix assured me I would like this movie, even though there were plenty of warning flags. For starters, the Netflix synopsis:

In this provocative film-within-a-film, director Sebastián (Gael García Bernal) heads to Cochabamba, Bolivia, to shoot a film about Christopher Columbus's trespasses in the New World, only to find the locals protesting present-day exploitation of the poor. Sebastián is sympathetic to the cause, but realities collide when lead actor Daniel (Juan Carlos Aduviri), cast as a rebel against the Spanish, becomes a key figure in the current demonstrations.

Sounds like tedious left-wing propaganda, doesn't it?

More: Googling the screenwiter, Paul Laverty, sends up some more red flags: he pals around with Michael Moore; he's an enthusiastic backer of anti-Israel boycotts. In short, kind of a jerk.

And finally, when the movie starts, up on the screen is (in Spanish): "Dedicated to the memory of Howard Zinn" Arrrgh. Kill me now.

But guess what? It turned out to be OK, under what I think of as the Sean Penn rule: even leftist jerks can make good movies. There's a decent plot with fully-realized characters.

And I enjoyed a neat twist: the movie-in-a-movie's producer, Costa, starts out as a no-nonsense, heartless, hardhead who wants to get the movie made without getting involved in the native troubles; the director Sebastián, in comparison, is a softie. But their attitudes gradually reverse, and by the end of the flick, Costa's become fully enmeshed, risking his life to rescue a native child, while craven Sebastián sits on the sidelines.


Last Modified 2024-01-28 2:23 PM EDT