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Movies / In Theaters / Broken Embraces
Broken Embraces

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Broken Embraces (2009)

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Reviews Counted:133

Fresh:108

Rotten:25

Average Rating:7/10

Consensus: Pedro Almodovar's fourth film with Penélope Cruz isn't his finest work, but he brings his signature visual brilliance to this noirish tale, and the cast turns in some first-class performances.

Australian Rating: TBC

Genre: Foreign Films

Australian Theatrical Release:
Apr 4, 2009 Wide

US Box Office: $4,281,527

Synopsis: A man writes, lives and loves in darkness. Fourteen years before, he was in a brutal car rash on the island of Lanzarote. In the accident, he not only lost his sight, he also lost , thef his... A man writes, lives and loves in darkness. Fourteen years before, he was in a brutal car rash on the island of Lanzarote. In the accident, he not only lost his sight, he also lost , thef his life.

Lena love o This man uses two names: Harry Caine, a playful pseudonym with which he signs his literary works, stories and scripts, and Mateo Blanco, his real name, with which he lives and signs the film he directs. After the accident, Mateo Blanco reduces himself to his seudonym, Harry Caine. If he can’t direct films he can only survive with the idea that Mateo Blanco died on Lanzarote with his beloved Lena. In the present day, Harry Caine lives thanks to the scripts he writes and to the help he gets rom his faithful former production manager, Judit García, and from Diego, her son, his secretary, typist and guide. Since he decided to live and tell stories, Harry is an active, attractive blind man who has developed all his other senses in order to enjoy life, on a basis of irony and self‐induced amnesia. He has erased from his biography any trace of his first identity, Mateo Blanco. One night Diego has an accident and Harry takes care of him (his mother, Judit, is out of Madrid and they decide not to tell her anything so as not to alarm her). During the first nights of his convalescence, Diego asks him about the time when he answered to the name of Mateo Blanco, after a moment of astonishment Harry can’t refuse and he tells Diego hat happened fourteen years before with the idea of entertaining him, just as a father tells his little child a story so that he’ll fall asleep. The story of Mateo, Lena,

Judit and Ernesto Martel is a story of “amour fou”, dominated by fatality, jealously, the abuse of power, treachery and a guilt complex. A moving and terrible story, the most expressive image of which is the photo of two lovers embracing, torn into a thousand pieces. --© Sony Pictures Classics
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Starring: Penélope Cruz, Lluis Homar, Lola Dueñas, Ángela Molina

Starring: Penélope Cruz, Lluis Homar, Lola Dueñas, Ángela Molina, Carlos Leal, Ruben Ochandiano, Rossy De Palma, Tamar Novas, Blanca Portillo, Kiti Manver, Chus Lampreave

Director: Pedro Almodóvar

Director: Pedro Almodóvar
Screenwriter: Pedro Almodóvar
Producer: Agustin Almodovar
Composer: Alberto Iglesias
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics

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Reviews for Broken Embraces

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1 - 20 (sorted by date; Australian critics are listed first)
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A cubist soap opera with enough time-shifted twists and turns to induce travel sickness, Broken Embraces is a distinctly disposable offering from Almodovar. Nevertheless, even his throwaway efforts would be considered absolute keepers by most filmmakers.

Full Review Source: Herald Sun (Australia) | comment Comment
12/17/09
Leigh Paatsch
Leigh Paatsch
Herald Sun (Australia)
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Spain's best-known living director Pedro Almodovar ranks among the modern masters of melodrama -- as he demonstrates once again in Broken Embraces

Full Review Source: The Age (Australia) | comment Comment
12/17/09
Jake Wilson
Jake Wilson
The Age (Australia)
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Broken Embraces is Almodovar on autopilot.

Full Review Source: Sunday Mail (Australia) | comment Comment
12/14/09
Colin Newton
Colin Newton
Sunday Mail (Australia)
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Sorry, Pedro, but this tepid trudge through the shallow stuff of men is most remarkable for being such a dramatic under-performer.

Full Review Source: Empire Magazine Australasia | comment Comment
12/14/09
Hilton Thomas
Hilton Thomas
Empire Magazine Australasia
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Even though it may not be Almodovar’s best film, it is still eminently watchable and thoroughly enjoyable.

Full Review Source: At the Movies (Australia) | comment Comment
12/13/09
Margaret Pomeranz
Margaret Pomeranz
At the Movies (Australia)
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Hypnotic beauty and emotion reveal the Spanish director to be still at the height of his powers.

Full Review Source: Sydney Morning Herald | comment Comment
12/13/09
Paul Byrnes
Paul Byrnes
Sydney Morning Herald
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

In Broken Embraces, his vibrant new mixed genre thriller, he is out to entertain and intrigue. Almodovar also wants to tell us something about desire and his love of cinema.

Full Review Source: FILMINK (Australia) | comment Comment
12/13/09
Julian Wood
Julian Wood
FILMINK (Australia)
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Tending to meander at times, there's still plenty to enjoy if typical Almodovar multiple narratives don't confuse you.

Full Review Source: Courier Mail (Australia) | comment Comment
12/13/09
Des Partridge
Des Partridge
Courier Mail (Australia)
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

The sure cinematic hand of Pedro Almodóvar falters and fumbles here as he attempts to fuse together a melodrama with a thriller plus something of a spiritual journey for his central character, Mateo ... superbly portrayed by Lluis Homar

Full Review Source: Urban Cinefile | comment Comment
12/12/09
Andrew L. Urban
Andrew L. Urban
Urban Cinefile
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

With its themes of revenge, sexual obsession, love and jealousy, Pedro Almodóvar follows his own tried and true recipe for grand melodrama...characters spin complex webs. It's engaging and involving, although it is not Almodóvar's best work

Full Review Source: Urban Cinefile | comment Comment
12/12/09
Louise Keller
Louise Keller
Urban Cinefile
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While the writing isn't as sharp or as funny as it is in Almodovar's best movies, so be it--it's a hell of a lot sharper and more interesting than most of the mass-produced movies coming out of Hollywood.

Full Review Source: Bangor Daily News (Maine) | comment Comment
02/07/10
Christopher Smith
Christopher Smith
Bangor Daily News (Maine)

This meandering melodrama is too fractured, too soap opera-ish and is just too odd ... even by the Oscar-winning, Spanish filmmaker's usual standards.

Full Review Source: Deseret News, Salt Lake City | comment Comment
02/04/10
Jeff Vice
Jeff Vice
Deseret News, Salt Lake City

Above all, "Broken Embraces" shows how deeply Almodóvar is in love with movies, not just as things to be watched and enjoyed, but to be felt deep in the bones.

Full Review Source: Capital Times (Madison, WI) | comment Comment
02/04/10
Rob Thomas
Rob Thomas
Capital Times (Madison, WI)

Gives us few reasons not to stay to the ending, but the ultimate revelation of Blanco's pain ... disappoints.

Full Review Source: Charlotte Weekly | comment Comment
01/31/10
Sean O'Connell
Sean O'Connell
Charlotte Weekly

A very worthy close-out for his remarkable output of the last decade.

Full Review Source: Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC) | comment Comment
01/20/10
Ken Hanke
Ken Hanke
Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC)

A cliche-ridden exercise that never exhibits any real heart and focuses on characters who never come alive, it also never comes close to living up to the promise of the names in the credits.

Full Review Source: Times-Picayune | comment Comment
01/18/10
Mike Scott
Mike Scott
Times-Picayune

In Almodóvar, the past is reckoned by characters of the present, a layering over which we revel.

Full Review Source: IdentityTheory | comment Comment
01/16/10
Matthew Sorrento
Matthew Sorrento
IdentityTheory

Almodovar dives into this knotty, plotty mess the only way he can - with utter abandon and what might be best described as a kind of artful recklessness.

Full Review Source: Arkansas Democrat-Gazette | comment Comment
01/16/10
Philip Martin
Philip Martin
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

The end result is less than the sum of its parts, a smoke 'n' mirrors melodrama that peters out just when it should be revving into high gear.

Full Review Source: Creative Loafing | comment Comment
01/15/10
Matt Brunson
Matt Brunson
Creative Loafing

The unbeatable Oscar-winning combination of legendary Spanish writer/director Pedro Almodovar and international superstar beauty Penelope Cruz makes this lavishly mounted melodrama a cinematic gem.

Full Review Source: Entertainment Spectrum | comment Comment
01/15/10
Keith Cohen
Keith Cohen
Entertainment Spectrum
 
 
1 - 20 (sorted by date; Australian critics are listed first)
Text View | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 >> >|
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