1/28/2007

Intimate Stories

Director: Carlos Sorin

The tag line for this unique Argentine character vignette promises that, “San Julian is waiting for you,” and it is not false advertising as we follow three very different characters all traveling to the same place for three very different reasons. Sorin’s lyrical work has been the official selection at several festivals worldwide earning the Best Film, Director and Screenplay awards from Argentina's Film Critics Association. Best described as cinematic short stories intertwined in a moving and delicately simplistic tapestry of universal humanity, we first encounter a young mother who packs up her child to participate in a game show in order to win an exciting prize. Along the way, we find ourselves tagging along with a lonely, admittedly peculiar but well-intentioned traveling businessman named Roberto and an elderly man who, despite failing health and eyesight, takes to the road to locate his beloved, missing dog Badface, who's recently been spotted in San Julian. Intimate Stories is as intimate as the name implies—gentle, fun and touching-- it provides a nice change of pace from message movies or overly crowded character pieces that try to force the audience into submission—Sorin’s film makes us care because we feel as though we’re watching lives being lived, not simply cardboard characters uttering dialogue from a predictable script.