El Secreto de sus Ojos
Caption: A retired legal counselor writes a novel hoping to find closure for one of his past unresolved homicide cases and for his unreciprocated love with his superior - both of which still haunt him decades later.
Director: Juan José Campanella
Writers: Eduardo Sacheri (novel), Juan José Campanella
Stars: Ricardo Darin, Soledad Villamil, Guillermo Francella, Pablo Rago, Javier Godino, Mariano Argento
Rating: R
Release Date: 13 August 2009
Budget: 2
million
Gross: $33,965,279 (worldwide)
Runtime: 129 minutes
Production Company: Tornasol Films, Haddock Films, 100 Bares
Synopsis:
Retiree Benjamín Espósito(Ricardo Darin) is having trouble getting started on his first novel. He pays a visit to the offices of Judge Irene Menéndez-Hastings( Soledad Villamil)to tell her about his plans to recount the story of the Coloto case, the one they both worked on 25 years before, when she was his new department chief and he was the judicial agent assigned to the case. She suggests he start at the beginning.
The beginning is the day that Espósito, was assigned to the rape and murder of Liliana Coloto, who was attacked in her home on a June morning in 1974. Espósito promises her widower, Ricardo Morales, that the killer will do life for his crime. His investigation is joined by his alcoholic friend and assistant, Pablo Sandoval (Guillermo Francella), and the Cornell educated Hastings. Before the three can start, their rival, Romano, tries to show them up by having officers beat a confession out of two innocent construction laborers, who had been working near the couple's apartment. Espósito gets them released and physically attacks Romano in a justice building hall.
Back on the case, the agent finds a clue to the murderer's identity in Liliana's photo albums. He notices that pictures from her home town of Chivilcoy frequently show a suspicious young man named Isidoro Gómez; his eyes never leave her. Irene finds this draft of the story unbelievable, since she does not agree that an agent can identify a killer by the look in his eyes. Benjamín insists all of a young man's feeling for a woman is spoken there.
Although Gómez was recently in Buenos Aires, he has left both his apartment and employment. Espósito and Sandoval travel to Chivilcoy and sneak into Gómez's mother's house, where they find his letters to her. Sandoval steals them but they contain nothing useful and, when their supervising judge learns of the illegal action, the case is closed. Over an evening review of the manuscript, Benjamín reminds Irene that it was only one week later that she announced her engagement. The memory is poignant, and she decides that she cannot revisit the past through his novel any more.
A year after the case was closed, Espósito runs into Morales and learns that he maintains daily surveillance at Buenos Aires railway stations, in the hope of catching Gómez passing through. Deeply impressed, Espósito successfully appeals to Hastings to reopen the case. In the end, Sandoval produces the critical insight: he realizes that names in the letters refer to players on Racing Club, a Buenos Aires football club, indicating Gómez's fixed "passion" for the team. Therefore, Espósito and Sandoval attend a match for Racing and spot Gómez in the crowd, who slips away when a Racing goal sends the crowd into a frenzy. Gómez is pursued by the duo through the stadium and nearly vanishes before he is cornered, arrested, and taken in for questioning. Espósito's largely illegal interrogation is interrupted by Hastings, but when she finds herself looking in the suspect's eyes, she uses her status and sexuality to provoke him with taunts about his masculine inadequacies. It works: he exposes himself and takes a swing at her in the same moment he confesses. Justice seems served.
Although Gómez was recently in Buenos Aires, he has left both his apartment and employment. Espósito and Sandoval travel to Chivilcoy and sneak into Gómez's mother's house, where they find his letters to her. Sandoval steals them but they contain nothing useful and, when their supervising judge learns of the illegal action, the case is closed. Over an evening review of the manuscript, Benjamín reminds Irene that it was only one week later that she announced her engagement. The memory is poignant, and she decides that she cannot revisit the past through his novel any more.
A year after the case was closed, Espósito runs into Morales and learns that he maintains daily surveillance at Buenos Aires railway stations, in the hope of catching Gómez passing through. Deeply impressed, Espósito successfully appeals to Hastings to reopen the case. In the end, Sandoval produces the critical insight: he realizes that names in the letters refer to players on Racing Club, a Buenos Aires football club, indicating Gómez's fixed "passion" for the team. Therefore, Espósito and Sandoval attend a match for Racing and spot Gómez in the crowd, who slips away when a Racing goal sends the crowd into a frenzy. Gómez is pursued by the duo through the stadium and nearly vanishes before he is cornered, arrested, and taken in for questioning. Espósito's largely illegal interrogation is interrupted by Hastings, but when she finds herself looking in the suspect's eyes, she uses her status and sexuality to provoke him with taunts about his masculine inadequacies. It works: he exposes himself and takes a swing at her in the same moment he confesses. Justice seems served.
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Late one night, while contemplating the sacrifice of his lost friend Pablo Sandoval, Benjamín gets a call from Irene asking to see the rest of the story. In 1975, the widower sees his wife's killer on television, included in a security detail for the president of Argentina. Hastings and Espósito quickly establish that Romano, now working for a special government agency, released the murderer to settle the old score. Romano insults them both, taunting Espósito for being beneath Hastings. Undeterred, she later invites Espósito to offer his objections to her impending marriage plans later that night. Before they can meet, however, he has to leave a very intoxicated Sandoval in his living room to run and fetch Sandoval's wife to take him home, but when the two return they find the front door broken and Sandoval inside, shot to death with a sub machine gun. Now fearing that Romano wants him killed, Espósito accepts the isolation of Jujuy province near the border with Bolivia. Hastings takes him to the train station for a disconsolate goodbye.
The novel complete, Irene shares her satisfaction with the results, although she doesn't find the scene in the train station believable. They agree the story lacks the right ending. Benjamín is looking for the answer to a question: "How does one live a life full of nothing?". With Irene's help, Benjamín locates Ricardo Morales leading a quiet life in a rural area of the Buenos Aires province and takes his finished book there. Although the widower apparently has relinquished his obsession with the murder case, Benjamín has to ask him how he has lived without the love of his life for 25 years. When Benjamín repeats Pablo's final promise to get Gómez, Ricardo hesitantly confesses that in 1975 he ended Gómez's stalking of Benjamín by kidnapping and shooting him dead.
A disturbed Benjamín starts the drive back to the city, distracted that something doesn't seem right. Impulsively, he pulls over, leaves his car by the side of the road, and stealthily returns to Ricardo's property. He follows Ricardo into a small building set near the main house, where he is shocked to find Gómez living in a makeshift cell, undetectable from the outside. Gómez plaintively asks Benjamín to request Ricardo to talk to him. Ricardo reminds Benjamín of his promise that Gómez would never go free.
Benjamín pays his respects at Pablo's grave, then goes to see Irene with an evident sense of purpose. She notices something different in his eyes, reminds him that it will be complicated, and asks him to close the door.
Comments:
This film narrative has two stories in it, the crime investigation that follows the murder of the young woman and the timid love story of the two judicial co-workers, that while attracted to each other can’t overcome life circumstances to be together until the end. The director keeps both stories interesting and both have their fill of suspense. While there are a few of plot twists that might seem outlandish(Isidoro’s release from jail and the subsequent private incarceration by the widower, the two secret lovers saying their goodbye at the train station), the unexpectedness of those events round this movie into a fine watch.
At the beginning of this film Benjamin meets with Irene during the present time, but later we get to see the story progress through the use of several flashbacks. These flashbacks occur throughout the movie, but the most interesting one, is the one when Benjamin suspects that Morales has imprisoned Isidoro in his guest house. As he ponders the significance of Morales words he recollects through the use of flashbacks, the words he had previously heard from Morales. Also the director Juan Jose Campanella moves in for several prolonged and emotionally wrenching closeups.
The setting of this movie is a delight to watch, as the viewer gets transported to the turbulent times of Argentina’s “dirty war”. We see the old fashions, vehicles and mountains of legal paperwork along with malfunctioning typewriters. But perhaps the best setting accomplishment is the continuous five-minute-long shot, that encompasses an entire stadium during a live soccer match. This was accomplished without a single visible cut, by using both CGI and extras in a real soccer stadium. This is a wonderful scene, one I have never witnessed in another film. While this movie time frame placed it in the troubled times of the “dirty war”, this film is not political in nature and it merely glances the subject, instead of deeply examining it.
The acting in this film was excellent and most of the characters were believable. Darin’s lean and wearied look conveys his character’s professional weariness and the torment he suffered due to the concealed love he had for Soledad’s character. Villamil’s angular face perfectly conveyed her characters patrician upbringing and her partial aloofness explained her unavailability. Francella’s drunk was a tragic, functional drunk and well done by an actor in his first non-comedic role(he is a famous comedian in Argentina). Rago’s widower was heart wrenching at times and at others just plain chilling. Perhaps the weakest link in the acting was Godino’s creep, but even he had his moments (in the elevator brandishing a gun in front of Benjamin and Irene and as an old man in the private cell.)
The dialogue in this movie was excellent and it does not get lost in translation, since there are several excellent quotable lines in it. The best line in this film is the following one:“…A guy can change anything. His face, his home, his family, his girlfriend, his religion, his God. But there’s one thing he can’t change. He can’t change his passion…”
All in all this is a movie that I would recommend for anyone that likes to watch movies that don’t have exploding cities and that make you think a little bit.
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