Stream it now Che: Part One 2008

 

For the fairly ignorant viewer (namely myself) who doesn't know too much about the life of Che Guevara, I found this slightly disappointing, this doesn't give much insight into the personality and aspirations of Che, instead opting to give a realistic view of what it might be like to fight a guerilla war. Not particularly entertaining, hampered with under developed characters and not helped by the cuts between past and present which stop the story from flowing, this is only made worth a watch due to the exceptional performance of Benicio Del Toro.

A heavy and hard hitting film

MPAA Rating: Not Rated

Runtime: 134 minutes

Plot:

The story about how Ernesto 'Che' Guevara (Benicio Del Toro) and a band of Castro-led Cuban exiles mobilize an army to topple the regime of dictator Fulgencio Batista.

Plus:

Great acting by Del Toro and an extremely well told story

Minus:

A little too long and you spend a lot of time waiting for stuff to happen...

Overall:

A nice but heavy movie that will require some time and attention to enjoy

MY Rating: 8/10

I would save your time. There is some interesting stuff but the movie is not as provocative as advertised. Del Toro is excellent, though. For as long as this movie is it should have delivered a greater impact. I am no more enlightened about che, fidel or the Cuban revolution than I was before spending 6 hours watching both parts.

I was expecting an intriguing account of why Che is such an iconic historical figure. Instead I got a patchwork of disconnected scenes that eventually put me to sleep.

The fact the movie is one of the biggest box office bombs in history, indicates how the majority of Che shirt wearing individuals are not even interested in exploring the truth. Thanks to this movie I did and there is a whole other side to it than this Hollywood attempt at portraying him as the hero. There are always 2 sides to a story and it seems here that by only trying to keep the t-shirt picture myth pesented the real truth is evident by the absence of it!.

Very interesting. Very well for Benicio del Toro.

(****): Thumbs Up

Well-acted and directed. A great film.

Independente das opini

A great movie although it does miss out some it is still a beautiful and fascinating film. Good acting good directing good action scenes. makes it good and one of my favorite movies ever.

----------------PART 1 The Argentine----------------------
SUMMARY: Hindsight is what I went to see Che: Parts 1+2 for, but Soderbergh robbed me of any of it., 7 November 2009

Author: lizziebeth-1 from Sydney, Australia


*** This comment may contain spoilers ***


Don't be surprised if you find Part1 confusing; I certainly did.

Obviously, a Spanish-only film will be unappealing to anyone uncomfortable with subtitles, while other-language speakers will rely too heavily on those subtitles and be forced to miss any continuity in Soderbergh's disruptive time-shifts.

Part1 is particularly offensive at this, because he leaves out far more story than he includes, and because he contextualizes events so poorly while intruding his "edgy" style of flashbacks and flash-forwards. Viewers are left like Eddie Murphy listening to James Brown records: "What the F did I just miss? -Sabbadie-dubba!"(said James Brown).

Prior to the final release's English voice-overs recorded by Benicio (helpfully less irritating than dubbing), Part1 presented unnecessary logic impediments, such as the fearfully episodic nature of Soderbergh's scenes, the lack of preamble/audience preparation for things that are about to happen, while the chosen events are so minimally and clearly Latino-centrically portrayed, that we really do feel like Eddie Murphy.

The real problem with his Latino-centrism is that once we get used to it, we really become distrustful of the veracity and insights of the future political fallout that the English-spoken interviews and flash-forwards represent. That is, Soderbergh WASTES any possible context with his disruptive and alienated English-speakers, yet they are the only real help on offer.

The rest of Che hacking jungle and battling ill-discipline amongst his "troops" just makes for way too much cinema verite (no perspective) as it remains an insufficient exploration of Che's reasons, or of the political effect he was having whereever he went.

There is also--and this is the big giveaway about who this epic was made for--no hindsight critique of either Che himself, nor crucially of the manipulated peasants who eventually sell him out to their own government.

Soderbergh BURIES HIS LEAD because he's weak on narrative. I wonder if he was deliberately chosen for this project by some backer who knew this. It's been 44yrs; hindsight is sorely wanted: it's what I went to see this film for, but the director robbed me of that.

The Sydney Film Festival version sported even more irritants, since eradicated:

A) way too many blue filter shots (poor man's day-for-night, last used in B-grade Westerns);

B) illegible, jittery subtitles yanked off too quickly, supposedly "compensating" for his unremitting Spanish; and

C) no helpful Benicio voice-over at all.

Both early and final release versions still have no opening credits so the audience has no idea whom/what to expect--making it such a triumph when we recognize the never (EVER) credited Matt Damon as a young priest shot mid-distance; and Soderbergh's nom-de-plume photographer credit of "Peter Andrews".

So what's with all this HIDING, Mr Soderbergh? Could it be that he's abashed by his altering style, feeling a little clumsy, perhaps? Jeezus, he reminds me of Billy the talented-but-crazy indie director on "Entourage" who made his career-killing stinker biopic on the show about...wait for it...Pablo Escobar. Pretty close.

David Stratton, writing in The Australian(03-Oct-2009) correctly observed that Part1 is "uneven"(and HOW), while Part2 "goes rapidly downhill" from there, charting Che's final campaign in Bolivia "in excruciating detail".

For me, there's only 3 good things in Che Part1:

i) Benicio DelToro's casting, and his marvelous PRIMARY makeup job--but NOT his bizarre, integrally terrible graying wriggler in Pt2--Benicio's leanness and beard are astonishingly close to some rather unflattering photos of Che;

ii) Seeing Che soberly and meaningfully address the UN in 1964 as Cuba's post-revolutionary Minister of Economics; and

iii) the scope of the battle of Santa Clara (near the end of Pt1).

That's it.

So I concur wholeheartedly with David Stratton that "(Soderbergh's) pace is deliberately slow, characterizations kept to a minimum" (as if the director didn't know what these should be used for); "the action, such as it is, plods along withOUT a visible dramatic arc, and Pt2 (in Bolivia) especially...feels almost unbearably slow and turgid".

Turgid, Mr Soderbergh, turgid.

The director's only defense can be that he didn't make this movie for us living in the non-Cuban/non-Bolivian sectors of the planet. No, he must think we don't/shouldn't need this. Instead, his awful anti-movie had to just pretend to NOT be boring cinema verite just so the remaining illiterate Latino peasants of the world would go see it. He must be hoping they might finally feel satisfied that he finally gave them the unadorned, unexpurgated truth about how/why Che was so expeditiously killed in Bolivia.

I just hope they liked it.(4/10)


---------------------PART 2 The Guerilla---------------------

SUMMARY: Not so much Lost in La Mancha as merely Dead in Bolivia....OR...Soderbergh reinvents himself as Borat of Bolivia, 16 November 2009

*** This comment does contain spoilers ***


Now that Che(2008) has finished its relatively short Australian cinema run (extremely limited release:1 screen in Sydney, after 6wks), I can guiltlessly join both hosts of "At The Movies" in taking Steven Soderbergh to task.

It's usually satisfying to watch a film director change his style/subject, but Soderbergh's most recent stinker, The Girlfriend Experience(2009), was also missing a story, so narrative (and editing?) seem to suddenly be Soderbergh's main challenge. Strange, after 20-odd years in the business. He was probably never much good at narrative, just hid it well inside "edgy" projects.

None of this excuses him this present, almost diabolical failure. As David Stratton warns, "two parts of Che don't (even) make a whole".

Epic biopic in name only, Che(2008) barely qualifies as a feature film! It certainly has no legs, inasmuch as except for its uncharacteristic ultimate resolution forced upon it by history, Soderbergh's 4.5hrs-long dirge just goes nowhere.

Even Margaret Pomeranz, the more forgiving of Australia's At The Movies duo, noted about Soderbergh's repetitious waste of (digital HD storage): "you're in the woods...you're in the woods...you're in the woods...". I too am surprised Soderbergh didn't give us another 2.5hrs of THAT somewhere between his existing two Parts, because he still left out massive chunks of Che's "revolutionary" life!

For a biopic of an important but infamous historical figure, Soderbergh unaccountably alienates, if not deliberately insults, his audiences by

1. never providing most of Che's story;

2. imposing unreasonable film lengths with mere dullard repetition;

3. ignoring both true hindsight and a narrative of events;

4. barely developing an idea, or a character;

5. remaining claustrophobically episodic;

6. ignoring proper context for scenes---whatever we do get is mired in disruptive time-shifts;

7. linguistically dislocating all audiences (even Spanish-speakers will be confused by the incongruous expositions in English); and

8. pointlessly whitewashing his main subject into one dimension. Why, at THIS late stage? The T-shirt franchise has been a success!

Our sense of claustrophobia is surely due to Peter Buchman and Benjamin VanDer Veen basing their screenplay solely on Guevara's memoirs. So, like a poor student who has read only ONE of his allotted texts for his assignment, Soderbergh's product is exceedingly limited in perspective.

The audience is held captive within the same constrained knowledge, scenery and circumstances of the "revolutionaries", but that doesn't elicit our sympathy. Instead, it dawns on us that "Ah, Soderbergh's trying to hobble his audiences the same as the Latino peasants were at the time". But these are the SAME illiterate Latino peasants who sold out the good doctor to his enemies. Why does Soderbergh feel the need to equate us with them, and keep us equally mentally captive? Such audience straitjacketing must have a purpose.

Part2 is more chronological than Part1, but it's literally mind-numbing with its repetitive bush-bashing, misery of outlook, and lack of variety or character arcs. DelToro's Che has no opportunity to grow as a person while he struggles to educate his own ill-disciplined troops. The only letup is the humour as Che deals with his sometimes deeply ignorant "revolutionaries", some of whom violently lack self-control around local peasants or food. We certainly get no insight into what caused the conditions, nor any strategic analyses of their guerrilla insurgency, such as it was.

Part2's excruciating countdown remains fearfully episodic: again, nothing is telegraphed or contextualized. Thus even the scenes with Fidel Castro (Demi

I had long wondered what the fascination was with Che Guevara, and while I feel the film adequately expresses a romantic vision of revolutionary spirit I still am left wondering at its end, though not enough to do any research it seems.

It is difficult to talk of one half without reference to the other, but as I saw the parts some weeks apart (and many viewers would end up with the same experience due to its length), it is what it is.

Here I found the story interesting and the portrayals of its characters to feel authentic. The pace was slow but thoughtful, and did a good job conveying a perspective on the historical events that gave rise to legend.

Perhaps it is the very attention to detail that made it seem stifling to me however. It isn't easy to watch at times.

Using an example of last statement I'd say There Will Be Blood can also be stifling and hard to view, that film worked excellently with me where here I find I can't even quite put my finger on why I find it average.

I'd only recommend it to patient viewers that are interested in the subject matter going in. Perhaps those with a proper learned perspective would see more.