Love in the Time of Cholera (2007) Reviews

• Amazing book. Wonderful story. Great film.

  magspunky2007-11-17

  Love in the Time of Cholera is one of my top five favorite books of all time. I was so excited when I heard it was being made into a movie. I'm one of those who approve of books being made into films, as long as they reasonably stick to the novel, because they bring a new perspective and life to the story. However, I had read nothing but horrible things about this film before I went to see it. Now that I have, all I can say to all those who had only negative things to say is: HAVE YOU READ THE BOOK? "Love in the Time of Cholera" retains the same authenticity and tone on the screen as it did on the page. Yes, the characters are strange people, but that is what makes them memorable; we see parts of ourselves in them and parts of their culture that molded them into who they were. Bardem's Florentino is being called a "creepy" "stalker", but his actions in the novel are no different then those on the screen and reflect the passion and desperation of the world he lives in. Fermina is being called "cold" and "unlikable", but in the novel that's what she is; a haughty, proud woman who keeps her heart buried. I know the number of bad reviews out there will undoubtedly outnumber the good ones. I don't care. I urge you to go see this film. The novel it follows is a classic and is one of the greatest love stories of all time. Its characters are not perfect, they are human. The scenery, costumes, and overall atmosphere of the film are authentic and moving. But at the heart of the images, there is a love story that is timeless, character traits that hit close to home, and a happy ending that it seems few of us find. This is why we watch movies. It's not the entertainment, the celebrities, or the technological feats. It is the stories that make us think, that cause us to question the world we live in. We all didn't watch "To Kill a Mockingbird" for the comedy or memorable performances (though they were). We watched it for the time it portrayed, the people it involved, and the message that made us ponder what our world was, is, and is going to be. "Love in the Time of Cholera" is a movie about us. The faults, successes, failures, and dreams we all have. It is worth anyone's time to see it at least once.

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• Good Intentions, Bad Make-up

  Agita2007-11-16

  I never read the book, I never read a review, I had no idea what I was getting into when I went to a film festival screening of this film. It's not hard to imagine that the book must have been a romantic experience chronicling a man's love for a woman spanning decades, it's also not hard understanding why you would want to take this story and turn it into a movie. What is hard to do is sit through it. There is obviously a lot of hard work and craftsman ship on display. Whatever the budget was, most of it made it to the screen – which cannot be said for most productions. However, it's never clear what the tone is, is this a comedy or a drama? Films can have it both ways and win, but here it seems to be they shot it two ways and weren't sure which way to go…so they did both. Bardem's character, Florentino, seems to go between being Chaplin and Norman Bates with his bowler's cap & comedic reactions on the one hand and his obsession with his crazy mother who arranges trysts for him on the other. His character at times seems to be brilliant and charming, and at others borderline mentally retarded. Complicating matters here, Florentino is played by two actors, Unax Ugalde as a teen and Bardem later in life. The choice to swap out the Ugalde for Bardem comes at a strange point in the story, it's when Fermina, the love interest, has not seen him in sometime. This might sound like the perfect point to swap out, but with Fermina played by the beautiful Giovanna Mezzogiorno though most of the film, it's confusing when Bardem steps in now as Florentino. It is here that the Fermina dumps Florentino with really no explanation, but most will feel for her decision as in a span of time that has not touched her...he as aged horrifically! And on top of that, this old man before her seems to be firing on a few lost cylinders. Is this a boy in love, or a psychotic about to rampage? You be the judge. Stalker. For his time on screen as Florentino, Ugalde is saddled with a prosthetic nose hoisted upon him to resemble Bardem. This is a HUGE mistake, as is, frankly ALL the make-up in this film which could single handedly be the death blow to the film because it is uniformly so bad that for most of the presentation you simply cannot take your eyes off of it. That fake nose, that fake beard, and Mezzogiorno in her 70's she doesn't look a day over 30. As mentioned, I did not read the book, but it seems the adaptation here may be too faithful, jamming in every aspect of the book. Part of what makes an adaptation difficult to pull off is the knowledge of what to leave out, and in some cases what to add! Here you're treated to so much information, so many locations (and lots of frighteningly bad make-up) the "romance" is left to the wolves. When Florentino and Fermina finally do get together in the end of the film, it's a relief, not to see them together, but to think the film will be over soon...but it's NOT. It goes on as now he must win her over! This film is filled with good intentions...and we know where that will sometimes get you. Bardem is lucky NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN opens this week, so anyone who caught this Colombian train wreck can get the bad taste out of their mouth.

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• Gabriel García Márquez' novel 'El amor en los tiempos del cólera' without the Magical Realism

  gradyharp2008-03-20

  For devotees of Gabriel García Márquez this unprofessional adaptation of his sweepingly romantic novel 'El amor en los tiempos del cólera' will sadly disappoint. Ronald Harwood's screenplay is a patchwork quilt that attempts to tell the story of longing for love in the manner of a novella/travelogue and despite the presence of some very fine actors in the key roles, director Mike Newell forgets to grasp the atmosphere that makes the original novel ethereal. Young Florentino Ariza (Unax Ugalde) is a poor dreamer working as a telegraph operator and sees and falls in love with young Fermina Daza (Giovanna Mezzogiorno), daughter of a wealthy mule trader Lorenzo Daza (John Leguizamo) who upon hearing of the infatuation whisks Fermina away as Florentino pledges undying love and fidelity to Fermina. Florentino's mother Tránsito (Fernanda Montenegro), his uncle Leo (Hector Elizondo), and his friend Lotario Thugut (Liev Schreiber) comfort him and try to encourage his mating with another woman, but as Florentino matures (now Javier Bardem) even the long list of sexual encounters cannot turn his mind away from Fermina. Fermina marries Dr. Juvenal Urbino (Benjamin Bratt), travels widely, has his child and ultimately discovers her husband's infidelity. Florentino inherits his Uncle's shipping wealth, becoming one of the wealthy class that would have made him an eligible suitor for Fermina when he originally met her. But time changes everything except Florentino's commitment to Fermina and after the death of Dr. Urbino, he has the chance to realize his long awaited dream of being with the now 70+ year old lover. The story spans fifty years in an unnamed city in Columbia (here Cartagena) and across the beauty of both South America and Europe. All of the basic elements are in place: the important missing piece is the magic of Gabriel García Márquez's prose. The huge cast is wasted on a script that is less than pedestrian: Javier Bardem tries to make Florentino a credible sympathetic character but is stuck in the mud of his lines; the brilliant Fernanda Montenegro attempts to paste together the pared down role of Florentino's mother; an unremarkable Giovanna Mezzogiorno fails to make Fermina worthy of Florentino's devotion; John Leguizamo is grossly and embarrassingly miscast; fine actors such as Unax Ugalde, Liev Schrieber, Catalina Sandino Moreno, Ana Claudia Talancón, Hector Elizondo and others are little more than cardboard caricatures of the original creations. One wonders how Newell and Harwood could have strayed so far from the mark of the potential that this beautiful novel promised as a cinematic transition. But what resulted from their collaboration is an overlong, boring, and sloppy version of the original story. Sad to see fine actors wasted in this film. Grady Harp

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• Superbad in the Time of Cholera

  Half_the_Audience2007-11-18

  The greatest challenge for filmmakers of period pieces is to infuse the work with some degree of relevance to modern culture. Perhaps in order to feed the current appetite for anti-hero male fantasies of social revenge and success, Mike Newell has managed to flesh out the sexual journey of it's retro-nerd protagonist, replete with the popular contagion of entitlement and now-expected rewards of conquest. Gabriel García Márquez' 1985 novel "Love in the Time of Cholera" remains a testament to Romance as Illusion, and Love as a higher calling to those with the maturity and understanding of humanity to appreciate it. However, in Newell's ambitious adaptation, save for the characters aging fifty-odd years, there is neither much maturity nor understanding of humanity. When the neophyte romantic Florentino Ariza (Unax Ugalde) spies the young Fermina (Giovanna Mezzogiorno) promenading through the plaza one day, he is forever smitten. Captivated by her beauty, (a mystery due to the irredeemable casting blunder), he pledges to remain a virgin until they can be together. After a heated exchange of letters, a sweet minstrel stroll in her courtyard, and a long-distance barrage of telegraphed yearnings, Fermina harshly rejects him citing the temporary insanity of youth. At this point all passion exits the film for good. Fermina 's father (John Leguizamo, who inexplicably transports Queens gang-tough shtick to 19th century Columbia) manages to broker his daughter to Juvenal Urbino, a successful doctor (Benjamin Bratt) after she recovers nicely from a false bout of cholera. The doctor too, you see, is so taken with his patient's beauty he must have her for his own. Maybe there is more in the water down there than cholera-- something that addles the senses of men. The lovely Catalina Sandino Moreno as one of Fermina's countryside ladies-in-waiting outshines Fermina in every scene they share. You wonder why the men aren't lining up to place a bid on her. Fast forward to an older Florentino (now played by Javier Bardem) using sex with women, lots of women, to alleviate the pain of his separation from Fermina. His pain endures for more than fifty years. Did I mention he alleviates his pain with lots and lots of women? Pain never looked so good. Part drama, part comedy, there is a curious tone to this movie: it's difficult to tell where the laughs were intended. At first what seems like a camp-romp, purposely anachronistic and self-reflexive, the movie confounds when it appears that the actors are playing it for real. Due to the nerdy fecklessness of the young Florentino, we're willing to overlook some of the earlier stilted moments. Yet there is some dialogue so unfortunate (supposedly lifted verbatim from the rumination-heavy novel), that it's doubtful it could be uttered out loud in any century with a straight face. Bardem, one of a handful of actors who can elicit our investment in his character no matter how despicable and self-serving his actions, carries the film. (Ugalde, who plays the younger Florentino as a puppy dog eyed Romeo, who looks like he could be Bardem's younger brother, deftly sets up the delusional character's obsessive nature that is handed off like a baton for Bardem to carry the rest of his days.) Giovanna Mezzogiorno on the other hand, must age from late teens to her seventies, and she does so less convincingly. The filmmakers evidently didn't trust that audiences could overlook the horror of an older actress to take us from maturity on. Bratt must make the transformation across the years as well, but the three of them seem to decompose at different rates, making for a few jarring scenes. Some critics have lauded the make-up crew's accomplishments. Frankly, the pancake looks as though it's in danger of sliding from faces in the jungle heat. Bardem, alone here in the ability to age in voice, posture, tempo and demeanor, in addition to the cosmetics, helps provide a signpost as to where we are in the life cycle-- just in case Florentino's ever-growing list of sexual conquests doesn't mark the time clearly enough. What's lacking most in the script by Ronald Harwood (so adept with his exquisite "Diving Bell and the Butterfly") is a thriving spirit, a transcendence, an irony. The movie is simply a superficial accrual of loathing: Florentino's of society, of Love, of the fate that denies him earthly happiness and which spurs his mission to bed more than 600 women in order to drive out the demon of Fermina that possesses him; Fermina's of herself as her body has the audacity to age, of her fading beauty, and of her husband's wandering eye. (Such is the fate of women whose sense of self-worth relies solely on their appearance.) Even at seventy, she still can't bear to make love with the lights on. You'd hope that she would grow comfortable in her own skin at some point in her life. Lucky for her, decrepit old Florentino doesn't see her as she really is-- he's still imagining her as a youthful sprite from a bygone time. The novel is a rich examination of love in its many incarnations with deeper themes underscoring how Romantic Love can disease the soul just as the dreaded cholera ravaged humankind. This adaptation is plagued with the endemic and dated shallowness of a tele-novela steeped in the tradition of patriarchal virulence disguised as drama and conflict. Interesting how Newell takes the book's passionate struggle of a male masochist trying to reconcile his idealism, and mutates it into an Apatow-styled adventure of a virginal lovesick loser turned lothario, who still gets the girl in the end. Uninspired camera work and sloppy transitions sadly waste the exotic locations. For all the sumptuous scenery and meticulous period set design, the movie has the feel of a "Lifetime Television for Women" M.O.W. Maybe there's a new cable network I don't know about: "Mid-Lifetime Television for Men" that this project can kick off.

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• Marquez Fans Will Not Be Disappointed

  VicenteVicuna2007-10-17

  The film, composed by all the talents making it, does a terrific job of capturing the essence of the book. Fantastic work! Congratulations to all! As much as I believe that cinema has the potential to be the most powerful and greatest art, it can only come very close to greatness when the job is an adaptation of the most magnificent novel ever written. The same is true when trying to adapt Shakespeare or convey the power of any genius' work like in films about van Gogh, Pollock, Zola, etc. From my point of view, I felt that the challenge in adapting the book was, for the most part, one of ellipsis, i.e. what do you keep and what do you remove? The scenes and lines of dialogue in the film taken directly from the book create a tapestry of brilliant surgery, if not "the perfect essence" of the book, certainly a brilliant essence or cinematic interpretation. But unfortunately for me, one who has been tortured for twenty years by the sting of the book's many poetic details and minutia, it is hard not to gasp at what is missing. Before viewing the film, I prepared myself for a 138 minute distillation of an incredibly rich and detailed prose manuscript of 348 pages. I thought then, and I realize now, that it would take a ten or twelve hour filmed version of the book to sate my twenty-year damaged psyche, but I am not so deranged as to hold it against a two hour film adaptation of the masterwork. The film stands by itself. It is a magnificent work. Maybe it couldn't be better. It just doesn't capture all of Marquez. It can't. An American audience, even an educated, worldly one, is still formed and informed by our Puritan society. People don't make movies in Hollywood about coveting another man's wife, dumping your fourteen year old lover (resulting in her suicide) to pursue the woman you really love, and so on, and so on... The film had to make comprises to get an 'R' rating and not cause our repressed and fearful media, and good white Christian core to flip out. Compromise drives Hollywood. Compromise drives the business of movies. Compromise does not play a role in world of Marquez's characters. I believe and hope that, very soon, the film and book will become organically linked as closely as any film and book can be. It may even create a bond as strong as the Puzo/ Godfather/Coppola connection. I certainly hope so. It could create an artistic and cultural advance which is so vital for humankind, and becoming more difficult to achieve in an impossible-to-believe world of re-emerging fundamentalists who are hell-bent on pummeling us all back into the stone age. I applaud all of principals who made this wonderful movie. Bravo! Viewers of "Love in the Time of Cholera" will gain more insight into what love really means.

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