Amazon.com essential video

Expect to be very hungry (and perhaps amorous) after watching this contemporary classic in the small genre of food movies that includes Babette's Feast and Big Night. Director Alfonso Arau (A Walk in the Clouds), adapting a novel by his former wife, Laura Esquivel, tells the story of a young woman (Lumi Cavazos) who learns to suppress her passions under the eye of a stern mother, but channels them into her cooking. The result is a steady stream of cuisine so delicious as to be an almost erotic experience for those lucky enough to have a bite. The film's quotient of magic realism feels a little stock, but the story line is good and Arau's affinity for the sensuality of food (and of nature) is sublime. You might want to rush off to a good Mexican restaurant afterward, but that's a good thing. --Tom Keogh ... Read more

Reviews (98)

Superb - One of the Great Foreign Language Films of Our Time
A thrilling, intoxicating masterpiece, "Like Water for Chocolate" will leave you hungry, happy and hung over with its surreal vision and unforgettable performances. Some of the film's charm lies in its uncompromising vision of what it must be like to be a poor, Mexican woman, surrounded by angry sisters and petty jealousies. The food is a miracle of texture and authenticity that makes the book a recipe lover's dream. But the spiritual aspects of the movie take it someplacve else altogether....by tying food and unseen forces together, the author and director have fashioned love as a cycle of human emotion coupled with betrayal and passion. Believers and non-believers alike are asked to suspend judgement and just BE with this movie, for it raises issues and themes rarely imagined or acheived on film. A few sequences are startling - such as a wedding party where every guest is gastronimically infected by a soup that is stewed with the tears of our protagonist, and they all end up regurgitating the mixture, and in the end, understanding that true love should not be gambled away for money or superiority. Another sequence, where the middle daughter Gertudis, is literally kidnapped by a horse riding gunslinger while she sits alone in an outhouse doing her business, is hysterical, yet also painful to watch, because it symbolizes the woman's need for free choice in a world where men have so much of the power. Besides, any couple who has eloped or married without their parent's blessings will quickly make the connection to their own experience. If you can keep up with the subtitles, I'd advise against a dubbed version, for in its Spanish - eloquent, funny and dramatic - the film c aptures its truest form of communication. And food as metaphor - used in other terrific fims like "Babette's Feast" - has never been presented in such an awe inspiring manner. This is a feast to be savored every step of its delectible way.

A passion for cooking and romance!!!
This has to be one of my all time favorite foreign films. I loved the book and I think the movie is equally good. The story is set around a young woman named Tita, who according to an unfair family tradition, must care for her overbearing, demanding mother. Because of this, she is unable to marry the young man she has fallen in love with and transfers her passion into the meals she prepares(with very interesting results!). Based on the book by Laura Esquivel and directed by her husband at the time (Alfonso Arau, who also directed the Keanu Reeves movie, "A Walk in the Cloud") this film is a captivating fairy tale that is sure to entertain.

a feast of the 5 senses, come to life
after you watch this movie, you will either want to eat, cook (preferably one of the mentioned recipes), make love or all three! i saw the version dubbed in spanish, and also read 3 selected chapters from the book, for spanish class. it's a work of art and genius, and it must be watched all the way through without stopping. the characters are excellently portrayed, and it combines love, feminism, drama, sensuality, lust, hope, passion, and humour, topped with cultural tradition and folklore. i don't know which one is better, the book or the movie. all of the 5 senses are provoked on a deep and perhaps even primal level, especially taste and smell, feverishly yearning for a sum greater than their overall parts (gestalt) - which brings up the sixth sense, intuition.

Like Water For Chocolate
In the novel, "Like Water for Chocolate," I found it very interesting that two young people, Tita and Pedro fell deeply in love and they could never marry each other. The best part about the book was that they had to hide their feelings from everyone but they knew they loved each other deep inside their hearts. I liked the fact that they loved each other until the day they died and they died making love to each other. I strongly recommend this book to other people.

Like water for chocolate!
This is a very sensual movie about two lovers who could not be together. I loved it and would watch it again and again. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Keanu Reeves is completely wooden in this romantic misfire by Alfonso Arau (Like Water for Chocolate). Reeves plays a World War II vet who hits the road as a traveling salesman and agrees to help a desperate, pregnant woman (Aitana Sanchez-Gijon)--who is afraid to let her father (Giancarlo Giannini) see her condition--by pretending to be her husband. Most of the story takes place in the old man's vineyard, and Arau makes a life of swollen fruit, grape-stomping, sunlight, and tan flesh that looks amazingly erotic. But there are plenty of sillier distractions, such as the sight of farm hands chasing insects with flapping gossamer wings attached to their arms. Reeves is terribly self-conscious, while stalwart Anthony Quinn is memorable as the damsel's benevolent grandfather. --Tom Keogh ... Read more

Reviews (81)

A beautiful romance
People often seem eager to criticize Keanu Reeves' acting and give negative reviews of his films unless they are action driven. This film was not a huge box office smash but its one of my favorite films with Reeves. The story is an old fashioned romance set against the Napa Valley wine country of Southern California at the end of World War II. Alfonso Arau, who also directed the great film "Like Water for Chocolate" uses lush colors, deep and rich, to convey the passion and sensuality, perfectly complimenting the storyline. Keanu Reeves and Aitana Sanchez Gijon make a beautiful couple and the scenes, such as one where the entire family and workers wear wings to fan warmth on the crops to ward off frost, is like something out of a dream. The music is beautiful and though the ending is a bit of let down, the story is very romantic and a must have for anyone who likes an old fashioned romance.

A CLASSIC ROMANCE MOVIE...
This is a romantic drama that is entertaining, despite Keanu Reeves' somewhat leaden performance and the overly contrived plot. Look to the late Anthony Quinn for a wonderful performance as the benevolent grandfather, who knows true love when he sees it. Look to the beautiful damsel in distress, affectingly played by the lovely Aitana Sanchez-Gijon, with whom Keanu Reeeves ultimately falls in love. Look also to the erotic, grape crushing dance and the idyllic cinematography. Overlook the ridiculous ending scene where one is almost embarrassed for Giancarlo Giannini and the rest of the cast. If you do all this, you will probably enjoy the film.

The movie plot is simple. World War II veteran returns home to the woman he had married just before he left to go to war. You get a sense of what is to come, when she is not at the dock to meet him, as he arrives after a four year sojourn. Puzzled, he goes home and finds her there, and you have to wonder what he ever saw in this dolt, notwithstanding her lovely figure. She seems totally uninterested in him as a person. She never even bothered to read the almost daily letters he sent her, which is why she never even knew he was coming home.

He goes off to his former job, that of a traveling chocolate salesman, even though it is clearly not something he wishes to do. While on his journey, he meets a beautiful woman named Victoria, who has a problem. You see, she is pregnant by a man who does not wish to commit himself, and she is on her way home to her close knit family in the idyllic Napa Valley. She is terrified of telling her very old fashioned father, played by Giancarlo Giannini, of her situation and is weeping copious buckets of tears over the expected confrontation. What does Keanu do? Why he suggests going home with her and posing as her husband, while she breaks the news to her family of her purported marriage to Keanu and her pregnancy. Once this is done, Keanu will ostensibly desert her and go on his merry way.

Of course, all the best laid plans often go awry, and this is no exception. They fall in love. Even though he could, he refuses to take advantage of her sexually, because another woman, his wife, has a claim on him. You gotta love this guy! He tries to leave a number of times, but is initially unsuccessful. It is clear that he would prefer to stay. When he finally leaves and returns to his so called wife, he gets a not so unwelcome surprise. A surprise that guarantees that all will be well in the end. Though the outcome is predictable, it is still a moderately enjoyable film.

Seriously awful sentimental blather
I saw this originally in the theatre, but caught it again on late night TV recently. What a disappointment coming from the director, Alphonso Arau, of the sublime classic "Like Water for Chocolate"! "A Walk in the Clouds" is cut from another bolt of cloth completely -- the treacly, sentimental "women's movie" of the 50s -- and utterly lacking charm, intelligence, realistic emotion or even plot coherence. Be warned that this is NOT the delightful magic realism of "Water for Chocolate".

There are so many lame, unbelievable details that its almost cruel to mention all of them. Paul (the flat, affectless Keanu Reeves, incapable of expressing anything remotely like romantic love) is a chocolate candy salesman who carries around ONE box of sample candy...in the heat of late summer. Apparently he is unconcerned about it melting in the heat or even about replacing the samples he offers to potential customers. Instead of selling the candy door to door in his native San Francisco, he somehow boards a train for Sacramento (even hotter!) but ends up in ... the Napa Valley. (Please consult a map to see why this is utterly ridiculous.) BTW: Look for Debra Messing (Will and Grace) in a small, thankless role as Paul's unfaithful wife.

Victoria (Aitana Gijan) is a Mexican American graduate student who has gotten pregnant by her married college professor, and is inexplicably returning home to Napa, where she will face the anger and scorn of her traditional Mexican family. Anyone who could have written this knows exactly nothing about the period (just after the end of WWII) and is in a kind of denial about the real lifestyles of Mexican American women at that time. I'll bet that there were precious few Mexican Americans (men or women) attending graduate school at Berkley at that time, and if there was, it would remarkable and worth commenting on. Even a basic 4 year college degree was a big deal in the 40s, let alone a master's. (Ms. Gujan, who is very lovely, nonethess is a little too old to be playing a college student.) Additionally, it is more likely that an unwed pregnant girl of that time, with disaproving parents, would have gone to a home for Unwed Mothers and given her child up for adoption. There simply was not the casual acceptance of illegitimate children at that time -- it was a genuine scandal -- and that's easy to forget today when the very word "illegitimate" has practically disappeared from the language.

Paul and Victoria decide to pretend to a sham marriage to fool her parents -- for one night! -- and then he'll abandon her, leaving her and the baby to the sympathy of her family. This definitely sounds like a plan that is NOT going to work right from the get-go, as everyone is (no surprise) highly suspicious of the situation. The two have prepared so little that they couldn't fool a bored INS investigator about their "relationship", as they clearly know nothing about one another.

Although the story appears to start in summer and warm weather (the characters are wearing summer clothing), six hours after arriving at the family winery, the weather turns cold enough to actually cause the wine grapes to FREEZE. In other words, the temperature dropped from the 70s to below freezing...in September. This isn't really normal for the Napa Valley, which is the chief wine growing region of California precisely because it is so temperate. (BTW: the Aragon family lives in a kind of high-style palazzo that looks more like the ostentacious home of a 90s-era film producer than a real working vineyard.) It is a sad comment on this whole film that the views of the vineyard are misty CGI paintings, rather than real photography...a strange choice when the area being referrenced is known to be one of the most beautiful and photogenic in the world!

Anyways, as the grapes are freezing, they put out gigantic smudge pots and all the characters grab giant silken "wings" and run out to the vineyards to perform rather elaborate "dances" to direct the heat to the grapes and prevent freezing. This looks and is perfectly ridiculous. I am also surprised that it works! Apparently so well that every member of the family apparently SLEEPS with such wings at the ready in case of sudden unseasonable frosts. (Victoria runs out to flap wings in her silk nightgown...a nightgown which a couple hours earlier she was too embarassed to allow Paul to glimse her in....how come she isn't shivering in this thin sleeveless garment when the presence of frost clearly indicates that the temperature is below freezing?)

The movie is literally one gaff filled moment after another, like those I have mentioned above. The next morning -- after the freeze, which has miraculously lifted and the temperature gone back to the 70s -- it's harvest time! The next day! and a couple of days later...you got it. The entire vineyard burns to the ground...except one tiny blackened root which is, YUP, it's the foundation root brought all the way from Spain hundreds of years ago. Apparently they are going to restart an entire several hundred acre vineyard with ONE ROOT.

I know that director Arau is Mexican and probably wanted to reference as much of his beloved homeland in this project as possible. Certainly there is a long history of Mexican Americans in California, so he had lots of choices. But I am fairly certain that the vast majority of vineyards in Napa were ITALIAN in the 1940s. Any of the hispanic actors cast could have convincingly played Italians and the old film this is based on was itself Italian. Making everyone Mexican is no more believable than making them Swedish or Lebanese...it's an affectation and utterly unrealistic.

The whole movie has the feeling of a stale, artificial tasting bon bon (not unlike the candies that Paul is half-heartedly trying to sell) -- old, dried out, tasteless, synthetic and generally unpleasant. There is a place for old fashioned romance in movies, but "A Walk in the Clouds" sure is not it.

Beautifully Filmed, But It Needed a Lighter Touch
A WALK IN THE CLOUDS was directed by Alfonso Arau with cinematography by Emmanuel Lubezki. These same two people worked on the magical film, LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE, so I expected to see some of that same magic in A WALK IN THE CLOUDS. And, I did. But only some.

A WALK IN THE CLOUDS is the story of Paul Sutton (Keanu Reeves) who marries quickly, right before leaving for Europe and WWII. When he comes home, to 1945 San Francisco, he finds his wife less than overjoyed to see him. Used to being alone (but hating it), Paul doesn't stick around and takes the train to Sacramento, instead. There he meets the beautiful-but-pregnant-and-unmarried Victoria Aragon (Aitana Sanchez-Gijon). Victoria comes from an old, aristocratic Mexican family and she's terrified of what their reaction will be to her pregnancy. Paul, smitten with her beauty and her charm (and just being an all round good guy, too) offers to "pretend" to be her husband for one day and then abandon her. Victoria and Paul agree that this is the best road to follow, especially where Victoria's stern and traditional father, Alberto Aragon (Giancarlo Giannini) is concerned. Of course, the inevitable happens and Paul and Victoria really do fall in love.

When Paul and Victoria arrive at Victoria's family's vineyard, Alberto dislikes Paul from the start. Paul is simply not aristocratic enough or moneyed enough or traditional enough to suit Alberto, although Paul does have more luck with Victoria's grandfather, Don Pedro (Anthony Quinn), who is a kinder and more accepting man than is Alberto.

A WALK IN THE CLOUDS begins well, and, in the beginning, it does contain some magic, but, for me, at least, it simply wasn't able to sustain that magic until the final credits. The writers handled the magical first half of the film with a very light touch, something this film, with its touches of fantasy, definitely needed. During the second half, however, they let the film slip into melodrama and silliness and the ending, for me, wasn't at all satisfying.

I think Keanu Reeves as Paul, a man searching for his place in the world, was woefully miscast. He was wooden, even during his love scenes with the very pretty Aitana Sanchez-Gijon (who is far better known in Spain). Sanchez-Gijon's performance lost some of its luster simply because she had to play off the very wooden Reeves so much of the time, but she did try and part of the time she even succeeded. At least she looked the part. She has a luminescence and effervescence about her that make us feel any man would be a fool not to fall in love with her. Giancarlo Giannini and Anthony Quinn turn in first-rate performances as Victoria's father and grandfather and they do much to rescue A WALK IN THE CLOUDS from mediocrity.

Despite this film's tendency to slip into heaviness and melodrama, each scene is a visual delight. Cinematographer, Emmanuel Lubezki, certainly didn't let anyone down. A WALK IN THE CLOUDS is gorgeously filmed and, on that score, it does rival, or perhaps even surpass, LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE. While the entire film is a visual delight, two scenes, in particular, deserve special mention. The first is a scene during which the women of the vineyard dance around in a vat of grapes, crushing them with their bare feet. That might not sound so gorgeous on paper, but it is both sensual and beautiful. The second scene that deserves a special mention is my favorite and revolves around the people of the vineyard as they "fly" through it at night on huge, gossamer wings in an attempt to keep the frost off the grapes.

If only A WALK IN THE CLOUDS could have kept the light, ephemeral feel it had two-thirds of the way through the film and avoided the disastrous fall into melodrama and it's horribly silly ending, I think it might have been a masterpiece. As it is, I definitely think it's worth renting, but I would have to think twice before buying it. It's certainly not going to be everyone's cup of tea.

I'm a guy and even I thought it was great.
Keanu's alleged "wooden-ness" fits his role in this movie perfectly (as a returning WWII vet who saw a lot of death and now is faced with a wife who doesn't understand him and a job he doesn't want).

The music is great too; I went out and bought the soundtrack.

Basically, it's a great romance movie with beautiful scenes, not a bad way to start a Friday evening with your lover. ... Read more

Reviews (98)

Superb - One of the Great Foreign Language Films of Our Time
A thrilling, intoxicating masterpiece, "Like Water for Chocolate" will leave you hungry, happy and hung over with its surreal vision and unforgettable performances. Some of the film's charm lies in its uncompromising vision of what it must be like to be a poor, Mexican woman, surrounded by angry sisters and petty jealousies. The food is a miracle of texture and authenticity that makes the book a recipe lover's dream. But the spiritual aspects of the movie take it someplacve else altogether....by tying food and unseen forces together, the author and director have fashioned love as a cycle of human emotion coupled with betrayal and passion. Believers and non-believers alike are asked to suspend judgement and just BE with this movie, for it raises issues and themes rarely imagined or acheived on film. A few sequences are startling - such as a wedding party where every guest is gastronimically infected by a soup that is stewed with the tears of our protagonist, and they all end up regurgitating the mixture, and in the end, understanding that true love should not be gambled away for money or superiority. Another sequence, where the middle daughter Gertudis, is literally kidnapped by a horse riding gunslinger while she sits alone in an outhouse doing her business, is hysterical, yet also painful to watch, because it symbolizes the woman's need for free choice in a world where men have so much of the power. Besides, any couple who has eloped or married without their parent's blessings will quickly make the connection to their own experience. If you can keep up with the subtitles, I'd advise against a dubbed version, for in its Spanish - eloquent, funny and dramatic - the film c aptures its truest form of communication. And food as metaphor - used in other terrific fims like "Babette's Feast" - has never been presented in such an awe inspiring manner. This is a feast to be savored every step of its delectible way.

A passion for cooking and romance!!!
This has to be one of my all time favorite foreign films. I loved the book and I think the movie is equally good. The story is set around a young woman named Tita, who according to an unfair family tradition, must care for her overbearing, demanding mother. Because of this, she is unable to marry the young man she has fallen in love with and transfers her passion into the meals she prepares(with very interesting results!). Based on the book by Laura Esquivel and directed by her husband at the time (Alfonso Arau, who also directed the Keanu Reeves movie, "A Walk in the Cloud") this film is a captivating fairy tale that is sure to entertain.

a feast of the 5 senses, come to life
after you watch this movie, you will either want to eat, cook (preferably one of the mentioned recipes), make love or all three! i saw the version dubbed in spanish, and also read 3 selected chapters from the book, for spanish class. it's a work of art and genius, and it must be watched all the way through without stopping. the characters are excellently portrayed, and it combines love, feminism, drama, sensuality, lust, hope, passion, and humour, topped with cultural tradition and folklore. i don't know which one is better, the book or the movie. all of the 5 senses are provoked on a deep and perhaps even primal level, especially taste and smell, feverishly yearning for a sum greater than their overall parts (gestalt) - which brings up the sixth sense, intuition.

Like Water For Chocolate
In the novel, "Like Water for Chocolate," I found it very interesting that two young people, Tita and Pedro fell deeply in love and they could never marry each other. The best part about the book was that they had to hide their feelings from everyone but they knew they loved each other deep inside their hearts. I liked the fact that they loved each other until the day they died and they died making love to each other. I strongly recommend this book to other people.

Like water for chocolate!
This is a very sensual movie about two lovers who could not be together. I loved it and would watch it again and again. ... Read more

Description

Based on the novel by John Grisham.Until that September in 1952, Luke Chandler had never kept a secret or told a single lie.But in that long, hot summer when 10-year-old Luke Chandler comes of age, two groups of migrant workers - and two very dangerous men - come through the Arkansas Delta to work the Chandler cotton farm.And suddenly mysteries flood Luke's world.A murder leaves the town seething in gossip and suspicion.A beautiful young woman catches Luke's eye.A fatherless baby is born, and someone has begun furtively painting the bare clapboards of the Chandler farmhouse, slowly, painstakingly bathing the run-down structure in gleaming white.As young Luke watches the world around him, he shelters secrets that could shatter lives - and change his family forever.A memorable adaptation of John Grisham's life-affirming story, A Painted House draws on childhood memories and "local lore" from his Arkansas roots. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

Great movie, great acting, Logan Lerman is a standout!
I haven't read the book, but as a movie, I was really impressed. Logan Lerman really shines, he really puts life into Luke. I really enjoyed getting lost into this movie and the acting made it easy to feel what they were feeling. A wonderful movie about a boy dealing with life, problems, yet still being a kid, a farm family trying to survive. I've found that when books are turned into movies, they often have many differnces from the books, so I try to view the movie separate from the book on it's own terms. The Painted House tells a story, and has feeling. Perfect, no, enjoyable, definately!!

A major disappointment
This was one of my favorite John Grisham books. When I learned it was a movie I could not wait to see it. Now that I have seen the movie I wish they never made it. It has the worst narration I have ever heard. The narrator spoke with no feeling or emotion and you could clearly tell he was reading from a script. I guess you can't expect much from a made for TV movie but I was expecting more. Great parts of the book were left out and the actors did a fair job portraying people that were so clearly defined in the book. I wonder if they even read the book?

one talented actor
My family and I enjoyed this movie. The story line was good and was a pretty clean movie for family entertainment. The actor we enjoyed the most will be missed if you are not looking for him, but about one fourth of the way through the movie he runs up to the movie theater and says "there's a fight behind the co-op". Then he appears in the fight scene a few more times, watch for him, his presence explodes on to the film and by far is the most impressive actor in the movie! Buy several copies of this movie to give as gifts and share this undiscovered talent with others! ... Read more

Description

A comdey-of-errors story about a peasant who comes into a corruption-ridden small town geared up for a visit from a federal government inspector.Mistaking the man, Calzonzin, for the Inspector, the crooked local officials fawn on the confused Calzonzin and ply him with bribes.Meanwhile the townfolk want his help.Just after Calzonzin leaves town and the local officials are celebrating, the real government inspector arrives ... Read more

Reviews (4)

CENSORED!!!!
I was disappointed with the "Calzonzin Inspector" DVD. It is shorter than the original and, in some point, you miss the pace of the original film that ironicaly, was also projected in open mexican television with minor cuts.

If you want the ORIGINAL "Calzonzin Inspector", don't waste your money until the FULL version appears.

In the other side, the image quality is excelent, but I have the feeling that also the actual audio was censored.

30 minutes shorter than the original
Although this is one of the funniest movies depicting government corruption in Mexico (so accurately in fact that its release was limited and it remained coomercially unavailable until today) this DVD is release is missing many scenes, which is unfortunate. I sincerely hope they release the full 2 hours.

Hysterical!
Calzonzin has been my favorite ever since I first went to Mexico as a teenager and discovered the Supermachos comics by "Rius." He has suffered much censorship throughout the years because of his satirical, biting, and true political commentary. Alfonso Arau has done a magnificent job of casting actors that look exactly like the original comic book characters...amazing. If you knew the comics, you'll enjoy this hysterically funny movie even more. I recommend the movie to everyone, it's even safe for kids, with a sometimes slapstick-type humor mixed with sophisticated political commentary you'll catch if familiar with Mexican politics and culture. I've been trying to find a copy to buy for nearly 10 years!
My all-time favorite!

A PICTURE OF THE OLD AND CONTEMPORARY MEXICO
A FUNNY DESCRIPTION OF OUR POLITICIANS. PLENTY OF MEXICAN HUMOR.STRANGE THING BUT THIS FILM WAS NOT SENSORATED AS MANY OTHERS. A NICE VIEW FACE TO FACE WITH THE REALITY OF OUR "MEXICO LINDO Y QUERIDO", NOTHING HAS CHANGED ... Read more

Reviews (15)

Not so bad
Before I watched this movie, I read very negative critics about it, but I decided to check it anyway,mainly because of Woody Allen.

This movie was not made to be taken serious. It's a crazy comedy, with lots of surreal elements and an absurd plot. It's a story about a butcher who kills his wife, picking her to pieces. Accidentaly, he looses her hand, which is later found by a mexican bind woman, who believes she's cured by a miracle. Then, the news are spread, and the whole city of El Nino believes in the power of this hand.

It may seem stupid, but it is actually a critic to fanatic people, who start believing in everything they see. The cast was well chosen. David Schwimmer plays a priest who is in love with a whore (shocking, isn't it?), proving that he can do more than Ross (Friends). Woody is funny and neurotic as always,and it makes the movie worth your money.

Of course, this is not the best film you'll ever see, but it is funny in a certain way.

Your Typical Weak Buzz Saw Milagro Farce
Although this often execrable, cheaply punning (e.g., "see" "si"), monolingual (the devil's!) monstrosity is easily among Woody Allen's worst (if not his worst) it is still, not so surprisingly, better than most films. That is because despite its socially unredeeming ploys (e.g., sex in church, a slattern-wife's severed bird-flipping hand that grants miracles such as big breasts and a dirt-scraping penis to a midget of a darker hue; and a poor Jimi Hendrix copy who sings obnoxious songs) it is kind of fun to look at the cast tramp through the mock New Mexico town El Nino. The end of the film, from which Allen with seeming genuine hostility draws the sermonizing moral that God seems to be saying "if you can't take a joke go .... yourself," is symptomatic of the film's comic misfiring and lack of subtlety. Some T, but little A although I confess I fell asleep in the middle. My favorite part was the recycled Lenny Bruce joke that the Jews didn't really kill Jesus, it was a party that got out of hand. Some of the bits with Kiefer Sutherland as a state trooper were also good. Allen, who plays a magician-butcher who cuts his pretty wife (Sharon Stone, good job) in half with a buzz saw to begin the show, near the end comes to confess his crime prefacing his remarks with the confession that he has never confessed before because he is Jewish. But what are the many scenes of psychoanalysis depicted in his films if not confessions by another name? I think this movie actually has a serious intent that was compromised by commercial expectations and Allen's aesthetic choice to make it a complete farce; it is clever, and better than watching Jim Carey pull faces, but lacks heart-as if Allen were seething with anger but had only the light, feathery pillows of commercially successful comedy available with which to vent his intense frustration (at Catholicism and religious hypocrisy in general, unfaithful women, cute guys, himself, death, unappreciative audiences, etc. etc.)

Woody at his worst
This was just a very bad film. It was rarely funny and downright painful to watch at times. Woody is way out of his element in New Mexico where this idiotic film is supposed to take place.

There is no question in my mind as to why this film never made it into theaters. It would have bombed in a big way. Even though there is a great cast, they don't have a good script to work with so the film falls right on its' face.

Don't waste a second watching this huge disappointment.

Unfinishable
I don't shut too many movies off in medias res. I definitely didn't expect to shut off a Woody Allen film in that manner. But I had to, just so I didnt have to hear myself halfheartedly guffaw a third time while trying to extract some joy from this tepid, unfunny, fantastic-in-the-bad-sense film. Its not a Woody Allen film per se-someone else wrote it, thank goodness...stars galore populate the screen, and not one of them really does anything funny or quirky at all...Allen's cynical mutterings are stale, and they let Eddie Griffin talk, and not Andy Dick? Watch the interviews with the cast to see them try and say something good about what they just excreted...that's funnier than than the film itself! Bad, bad, unequivocally awful movie no matter what the ravers say, if you have any intelligence or taste at all, heed my admonition, you will waste money on this!Why don't you see Sleeper instead?

Stupidity is not funny
Like some of the other reviewers, I picked up this movie because of the cast, particularly Woody Allen. The one good thing about it is that it wasn't very long, and that I didn't buy it, but rent it cheaply from my local library. Everything else about it is bad.

The premise is not bad as far as it goes. Tex, a NY butcher (hopefully a kosher/halal one?) living in Texas marries a floozy who cheats on him at every turn. He kills her, dismembers her and drives over to the New Mexico town of El Niño to bury her corpse. In the way, he loses a hand. A blind woman stumbles over the hand and regains her vision. The hand is delivered to the local church where, in spite of the opposition of the priest, it is displayed as the Virgin's hand. It quickly confirms this reputation and transform's the windswept town into a tourist mecca. One of the dead woman's lovers, an irritating Texas ranger, find out about the murder an tries to arrest Tex and confiscate the missing hand. The local townspeople rebel, kill the ranger, release Tex, and keep the hand. A parallel plot concerns the priest who has lost his faith and is in love with one of the local hookers. The hooker first attempts to become celibate and then marries the priest.

So what's wrong with this picture? Virtually everything. It's not being away from New York that has killed Woody Allen's jokes, but the fact that he is no longe allowed to take center stage or to roam freely across his multiple obsessions. Sharon Stone, as his adulterous wife and murder victim, must have been so stricken by the mediocre result that her name has been stricken from the marquee: one looks in vain for her name as the credits pass by (at the movie's end, rather than the beginning, which was surely no accident). David Schwimmer is utterly unrealistic as a priest, instead playing again the bumbling and incoherent character that made him rich at "Friends". Maria Grazia Cucinotta, as the obligatory hooker with a heart of gold is OK, although one wonders why she should fall in love with such a bland character as Schwimmer's priest. Of course it's possible (beautiful women are notorious for their rotten taste in partners) but it doesn't make for a funny movie. Kiefer Sutherland, as the Texas ranger, is even good rather than OK, since he conveys a sense of menace and aggression whenever he appears on the screen. Contrary to the rest of the cast, he stands for something, and has a personality, a rare commodity in this movie. Three actors who play a priest, a nun and a Franciscan monk on a mission from the archbishop to authenticate the supposed holy relic are ludicrous rather than funny. Stupidity is not funny. Clumsiness may be funny (witness Laurel and Hardy), but only when redeemed by some endearing trait (such as friendship or loyalty). These characters are cyphers. They are nothing more than authority figures to mock, and not even that at times.

Other reviewers have commented on the film's disrespect for religion and priesthood. That's not the problem. Humour, like love, forgives all. The movie just isn't funny, and so its vulgarity and crudeness are unjustified. With no less than 3 major actors (Allen, Stone and Sutherland) and a great or at least distinguished support cast (Cucinotta, Schwimmer, Drescher, to name a few) it is much less than the sum of its parts. Vulgarity and lewdness are not funny by themselves, but only as part of a reasonable portrayal of human foibles. In this movie genitalia, breasts, profanity and lewdness are in fact substitutes for a plot or for well-rendered characters. This sort of thing may work (more or less) in "gross-out" films intended for the 13-year old set (such as "American Pie", "Dumb and Dumber" or the "Scary Movie" series) but it doesn't in a movie intended for adults. You'd have more fun drinking yourself blind while reading P.J. O'Rourke. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Creative License With Reality... And Lots of Fun!
This is a highly enjoyable, sentimental romance movie.

Thing is, I'm not much on sentimental romance movies. But this is so visually stunning, filled with such beautiful imagery and gorgeous music, that it will take your breath away.

But what I find really fascinating about this movie is that it breaks an implicit contract between the viewer and the filmmakers. And it does it with such huge impertinence and utter disregard for this silent, unspoken trust that I find it outrageous, shocking, incredibly funny, and, in a strange way, admirable.

What is that implicit contract between viewer and filmmakers? It's that, unless the movie is outright science fiction or fantasy, you are being told truths about the world we live in. For instance, if you are being shown things in a movie that is placed in a particular historical time period, you assume that at least some research was done to make an attempt at an accurate portrayal of that time. And if you are being shown things about a business or a process that most people know little about - in this case winemaking - then you will learn some true things about that business or process.

Not in this movie.

Here's an example: this movie teaches us that if frost falls on a crop of grapes at a vineyard (and it's quite true that frost can kill a crop of grapes), the workers go out at night with candles and torches, and they don huge white wings on their arms that make them resemble giant white moths. Then they go through the fields flapping their giant wings to warm the grapes and keep the frost away with the warmth of the torches and candles, creating a spectacle of unearthly, ghostly beauty.

No they don't! They never did that! Not in real life! The filmmakers just made this up! It's really funny when you think about it!

But it sure LOOKS good!

In another touching and lovely scene, the young Spanish girl's father, who owns the vineyard, (wonderfully played by Anthony Quinn), sings to Keanu Reaves one of the oldest and most beautiful songs in the history of Spanish music. Oh, it's beautiful all right - no argument there. He speaks of this classic with the reverence that such an old and gorgeous song deserves. However, if you note the credits at the end of the film, the song was composed by the film's composer and a lyricist in 1995, the year the film was made! Well, it SOUNDS like a very old and classic song! But they made this up, too!

Why did they do this? I don't know!! But it's funny!!

I'm pretty sure that the ceremonial crushing of grapes to erotic dancing and music is not and never was a part of any vineyard that is actually in the business of making wine, certainly not in the last 100 years, but I couldn't swear to it. But it fits this very aptly-named "Walk in the Clouds" perfectly.

No real criticisms here. Being a writer myself, it's kind of inspiring to know that if you don't know anything about something, you can just make it all up! Who needs research??

Really, these guys have a lot of nerve. But you gotta love 'em for it. And it all makes for a lovely, entertaining movie.

Just don't believe ANYTHING you see here!

A CLASSIC ROMANCE MOVIE...
This is a romantic drama that is entertaining, despite Keanu Reeves' somewhat leaden performance and the overly contrived plot. Look to the late Anthony Quinn for a wonderful performance as the benevolent grandfather, who knows true love when he sees it. Look to the beautiful damsel in distress, affectingly played by the lovely Aitana Sanchez-Gijon, with whom Keanu Reeves ultimately falls in love. Look also to the erotic, grape crushing dance and the idyllic cinematography. Overlook the ridiculous ending scene where one is almost embarrassed for Giancarlo Giannini and the rest of the cast. If you do all this, you will probably enjoy the film.

The movie plot is simple. World War II veteran returns home to the woman whom he had married just before he left to go to war. You get a sense of what is to come, when she is not at the dock to meet him, as he arrives after a four year sojourn. Puzzled, he goes home and finds her there, and you have to wonder what he ever saw in this dolt, notwithstanding her lovely figure. She seems totally uninterested in him as a person. She never even bothered to read the almost daily letters he sent her, which is why she never even knew he was coming home.

He goes off to his former job, that of a traveling chocolate salesman, even though it is clearly not something he wishes to do. While on his journey, he meets a beautiful woman named Victoria, who has a problem. You see, she is pregnant by a man who does not wish to commit himself, and she is on her way home to her close knit family in the idyllic Napa Valley. She is terrified of telling her very old fashioned father, played by Giancarlo Giannini, of her situation and is weeping copious buckets of tears over the expected confrontation. What does Keanu do? Why he suggests going home with her and posing as her husband, while she breaks the news to her family of her purported marriage to Keanu and her pregnancy. Once this is done, Keanu will ostensibly desert her and go on his merry way.

Of course, all the best-laid plans often go awry, and this is no exception. They fall in love. Even though he could, he refuses to take advantage of her sexually, because another woman, his wife, has a claim on him. You gotta love this guy! He tries to leave a number of times, but is initially unsuccessful. It is clear that he would prefer to stay. When he finally leaves and returns to his so called wife, he gets a not so unwelcome surprise. A surprise that guarantees that all will be well in the end. Though the outcome is predictable, it is still a moderately enjoyable film. ... Read more

Reviews (98)

Superb - One of the Great Foreign Language Films of Our Time
A thrilling, intoxicating masterpiece, "Like Water for Chocolate" will leave you hungry, happy and hung over with its surreal vision and unforgettable performances. Some of the film's charm lies in its uncompromising vision of what it must be like to be a poor, Mexican woman, surrounded by angry sisters and petty jealousies. The food is a miracle of texture and authenticity that makes the book a recipe lover's dream. But the spiritual aspects of the movie take it someplacve else altogether....by tying food and unseen forces together, the author and director have fashioned love as a cycle of human emotion coupled with betrayal and passion. Believers and non-believers alike are asked to suspend judgement and just BE with this movie, for it raises issues and themes rarely imagined or acheived on film. A few sequences are startling - such as a wedding party where every guest is gastronimically infected by a soup that is stewed with the tears of our protagonist, and they all end up regurgitating the mixture, and in the end, understanding that true love should not be gambled away for money or superiority. Another sequence, where the middle daughter Gertudis, is literally kidnapped by a horse riding gunslinger while she sits alone in an outhouse doing her business, is hysterical, yet also painful to watch, because it symbolizes the woman's need for free choice in a world where men have so much of the power. Besides, any couple who has eloped or married without their parent's blessings will quickly make the connection to their own experience. If you can keep up with the subtitles, I'd advise against a dubbed version, for in its Spanish - eloquent, funny and dramatic - the film c aptures its truest form of communication. And food as metaphor - used in other terrific fims like "Babette's Feast" - has never been presented in such an awe inspiring manner. This is a feast to be savored every step of its delectible way.

A passion for cooking and romance!!!
This has to be one of my all time favorite foreign films. I loved the book and I think the movie is equally good. The story is set around a young woman named Tita, who according to an unfair family tradition, must care for her overbearing, demanding mother. Because of this, she is unable to marry the young man she has fallen in love with and transfers her passion into the meals she prepares(with very interesting results!). Based on the book by Laura Esquivel and directed by her husband at the time (Alfonso Arau, who also directed the Keanu Reeves movie, "A Walk in the Cloud") this film is a captivating fairy tale that is sure to entertain.

a feast of the 5 senses, come to life
after you watch this movie, you will either want to eat, cook (preferably one of the mentioned recipes), make love or all three! i saw the version dubbed in spanish, and also read 3 selected chapters from the book, for spanish class. it's a work of art and genius, and it must be watched all the way through without stopping. the characters are excellently portrayed, and it combines love, feminism, drama, sensuality, lust, hope, passion, and humour, topped with cultural tradition and folklore. i don't know which one is better, the book or the movie. all of the 5 senses are provoked on a deep and perhaps even primal level, especially taste and smell, feverishly yearning for a sum greater than their overall parts (gestalt) - which brings up the sixth sense, intuition.

Like Water For Chocolate
In the novel, "Like Water for Chocolate," I found it very interesting that two young people, Tita and Pedro fell deeply in love and they could never marry each other. The best part about the book was that they had to hide their feelings from everyone but they knew they loved each other deep inside their hearts. I liked the fact that they loved each other until the day they died and they died making love to each other. I strongly recommend this book to other people.

Like water for chocolate!
This is a very sensual movie about two lovers who could not be together. I loved it and would watch it again and again. ... Read more

Description

Finally, Orson Welles’ masterpiece has been refilmed to reflect hisoriginal artistic vision.THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS, Welles’ follow-up toCitizen Kane, fell victim to a bitter struggle between the filmmaker and RKO Pictures,wich radically re-edited it for release, cutting over an hour of footage and shooting a newending.After 60 years, Welles’ vision of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Booth Tarkingtonnovel has finally been realized.Using the original shooting script, director Alfonso Arau(Like Water for Chocolate) and an extraordinary cast featuringJames Cromwell (Babe,L.A. Confidential), Madeleine Stowe (12 Monkeys, Short Cuts), and Gretchen Mol(Sweet and Lowdown), have re-filmed every scene according to Welles’ directions.Theresult is a haunting story of a wealthy Midwestern family’s struggle to adapt to therapidly changing world at the turn of the 20th century and the long-overdue restoration ofa missing piece of America’s cinematic heritage ... Read more

Reviews (19)

Long-awaited and disappointing
... delayed release of "The Magnificant Ambersons" for a year after its completion, and now we know why.
Perhaps the editors hoped in post production to create what Director Alfonso Arau could not realize on film.

With his quirky direction, Arau aimed for the sublime and ended up with something ridiculous. His take on "The Magnificant Ambersons" not only fails to redeem Orson Welles' 1942 vision, it fails on the level of fundamental storytelling.

It wasn't the fault of the story.
Boothe Tarkington's novel about the decline of the land-wealthy, prestigious Amberson family in the face of modernization, the Industrial Revolution and growth of the middle class was a grand American tale.

It wasn't for lack of money.
The production had a lavish budget. It was shot at an old estate in Ireland and no expense was spared constructing a set that looked like turn-of-the-century Indianapolis.

It wasn't the fault of the actors.
The wonderful cast included such talented actors as James Cromwell, Bruce Greenwood, Madeline Stowe and Jonathan Rhys Meyers.

Arau gave most of them too little to do.
In the role of Major Amberson, a Civil War veteran made good on land speculation, Cromwell should have given us more insight into the actions and past of the Ambersons - how that led to the warped, rigid value system of his grandson, Georgie.

Georgie Minafer (Rhys Meyers) is supposed to have charms that buffer his dark tendencies to be bigoted, narrow-minded and incestuous, he acts like a brat with attention defecit disorder, always flailing about.
His character never gets to move beyond one whining, pouting note.
Thus, when circumstances force a change on his part, the change seems wholely implausible.

Before its release, star Madeline Stowe bemoaned the production, which probably wasn't the right thing to do.

In hindsight, though, I can understand her complaint.
Although her character is meant to charm two men in her life - the lost love of her youth (played by Greenwood) and her son, she seems almost robot-like.

Stowe complained that Arau emphasized the incestous tendency between Georgie and his mother, Isabel, but frankly no heat or sparks of that kind were generated.

Again, I blame Arau because I have seen Rhys Meyers deliver marvelous performances in "Gormenghast," Ang Lee's "Ride With the Devil" and lesser known Irish gems such as "Michael Collins" and "The Disappearance of Finbar."

I recommend you rent one of them...

A Magnificent Cast
I found the cast delightfully over the top, and thoroughly enjoyed the mugging and pouts from Jennifer Tilly and Jonathan Rhys Meyers. I have never seen Gretchen Mol give an interesting performance, but she manages to hold her own.
I'm sure it's not what Arau intended for his film, but the results are still highly entertaining.

WONDERFUL
A very brilliantly acted and sad movie. Jonathon Ryss Meyers does it again! He was excellent in the movie VELVET GOLDMINE and he is also good in this role as well. Jennifer Tilly is also good. Jonathon is a very talented and good looking new actor. I recomend all his films.

MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS
i saw part of this movie on a and e or some other channel and i wished i could own it and i saw dvd on amazon. I DIDNT SEE WHOLE MOVIE but i got to see it eventually and it is interesting U GOTA ADMIT THAT dont tell me u people wernt watching all the wway through waiting to see what was goin on with that mother and son.- there was somthin wierd goin on between the mom and son. kept me watchin and also u have to admit THE ACTING WAS great. they WERE BELIEVABLE TO ME. MAYBE NOT AS GOOD AS ORSON WELLS BUT COME ON IT WAS GOOD . IT WAS MAGNIFICENT IN MANY WAYS. but it did lack in certain areas its about a 3.5 -

A&E Magnificent Amberons remake
A crashing disappointment. Despite the hype of using Welles' "original screenplay", it is evident that director Arau was determined to avoid any hint of Welles' inspired narrative & cinematography. Result: bland city throughout. At 1/10 the budget, Welles 1942 film achieved ten times the artistry in 88 minutes vs. A&E's nominal four hours. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Si me llamas amor
This is one of my favorite movies, and it is not because of Keanu Reeves. The story line is a somewhat cheezy, yet charming, tale of post-war romance where Keanu's character battles with the choices he's made before the war, and the opportunities he finds when he returns -- and meets a woman. Out of kindness to the new woman he has met (who is not his wife! yes, he married before the war), he encounters new battles as he lies to help her out of a potentially bad situation, only to find that he is quickly caught up in a family ordeal (and a personal battle of integrity in regards to his own marriage). Without giving too much away, the movie is cute and romantic, as Keanu serenades her with "amor, si me llamas amor!" (one of my favorite parts :) ...) and finds out what it really is to have love and a family. ... Read more

Reviews (4)

CENSORED!!!!
I was disappointed with the "Calzonzin Inspector" DVD. It is shorter than the original and, in some point, you miss the pace of the original film that ironicaly, was also projected in open mexican television with minor cuts.

If you want the ORIGINAL "Calzonzin Inspector", don't waste your money until the FULL version appears.

In the other side, the image quality is excelent, but I have the feeling that also the actual audio was censored.

30 minutes shorter than the original
Although this is one of the funniest movies depicting government corruption in Mexico (so accurately in fact that its release was limited and it remained coomercially unavailable until today) this DVD is release is missing many scenes, which is unfortunate. I sincerely hope they release the full 2 hours.

Hysterical!
Calzonzin has been my favorite ever since I first went to Mexico as a teenager and discovered the Supermachos comics by "Rius." He has suffered much censorship throughout the years because of his satirical, biting, and true political commentary. Alfonso Arau has done a magnificent job of casting actors that look exactly like the original comic book characters...amazing. If you knew the comics, you'll enjoy this hysterically funny movie even more. I recommend the movie to everyone, it's even safe for kids, with a sometimes slapstick-type humor mixed with sophisticated political commentary you'll catch if familiar with Mexican politics and culture. I've been trying to find a copy to buy for nearly 10 years!
My all-time favorite!

A PICTURE OF THE OLD AND CONTEMPORARY MEXICO
A FUNNY DESCRIPTION OF OUR POLITICIANS. PLENTY OF MEXICAN HUMOR.STRANGE THING BUT THIS FILM WAS NOT SENSORATED AS MANY OTHERS. A NICE VIEW FACE TO FACE WITH THE REALITY OF OUR "MEXICO LINDO Y QUERIDO", NOTHING HAS CHANGED ... Read more

Reviews (4)

CENSORED!!!!
I was disappointed with the "Calzonzin Inspector" DVD. It is shorter than the original and, in some point, you miss the pace of the original film that ironicaly, was also projected in open mexican television with minor cuts.

If you want the ORIGINAL "Calzonzin Inspector", don't waste your money until the FULL version appears.

In the other side, the image quality is excelent, but I have the feeling that also the actual audio was censored.

30 minutes shorter than the original
Although this is one of the funniest movies depicting government corruption in Mexico (so accurately in fact that its release was limited and it remained coomercially unavailable until today) this DVD is release is missing many scenes, which is unfortunate. I sincerely hope they release the full 2 hours.

Hysterical!
Calzonzin has been my favorite ever since I first went to Mexico as a teenager and discovered the Supermachos comics by "Rius." He has suffered much censorship throughout the years because of his satirical, biting, and true political commentary. Alfonso Arau has done a magnificent job of casting actors that look exactly like the original comic book characters...amazing. If you knew the comics, you'll enjoy this hysterically funny movie even more. I recommend the movie to everyone, it's even safe for kids, with a sometimes slapstick-type humor mixed with sophisticated political commentary you'll catch if familiar with Mexican politics and culture. I've been trying to find a copy to buy for nearly 10 years!
My all-time favorite!

A PICTURE OF THE OLD AND CONTEMPORARY MEXICO
A FUNNY DESCRIPTION OF OUR POLITICIANS. PLENTY OF MEXICAN HUMOR.STRANGE THING BUT THIS FILM WAS NOT SENSORATED AS MANY OTHERS. A NICE VIEW FACE TO FACE WITH THE REALITY OF OUR "MEXICO LINDO Y QUERIDO", NOTHING HAS CHANGED ... Read more