VALENTÍN
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 2004 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): **
Cloying and annoying seven-year-old Rodrigo Noya stars in Alejandro Agrestiauto's VALENTÍN, an autobiographical story that is silly, sappy and sometimes bittersweet. Were it not for the film's subtitles, it would likely be marketed to mainstream audiences as a funny kids' comedy, but, given that it's in Spanish, the movie will probably be advertised to art house audiences as the next CINEMA PARADISO. With its talky script -- Valentín (Noya) yammers constantly in the present and in voice-over -- the movie makes you wish sometimes that the adults would just ask him to shut up. I never laughed at his antics or any of the incidents in the story.
A cross-eyed boy who wears thick black glasses, Valentín is a motor mouth who dreams of being a NASA astronaut. He lives with his paternal grandmother since his parents have become AWOL in his life. His dad does show up periodically with yet another new girlfriend whom, he tells Valentín, may be his next mom. The movie works -- or doesn't -- based on Noya's performance since the adults in the story are uniformly uninteresting.
Although the movie is basically edge free, its one dramatic moment comes in a scene, which feels lifted out of some other film, about a priest who tells his congregation something that they don't want to hear. The priest praises the revolutionary guerilla Che Guevara, which causes many of his parishioners to walk out in protest. The director, who was at our screening, said that this episode was inserted, not for political purposes, but to date the story to 1969 when it is set.
If this exact same movie with the same script and the same actors had been made here, it would have gone straight to video and gathered dust on video store shelves. But since it is imported, American art house audiences might like it.
VALENTÍN runs 1:19. The film is in Spanish with English subtitles. It is rated PG-13 for "some thematic elements and language" and would be acceptable for kids around 9 and up.
The film, which is already open in much of the world, opens in limited release in the United States on Friday, May 7, 2004. In the Silicon Valley, it will be showing at the Camera Cinemas. The movie was shown recently at the Camera Cinema Club (http://www.cameracinemas.com) of Campbell and San Jose.
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