Butterfly
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Movie Reviews of Butterfly
Movie Review: The Human Heart Is Filled with Kindess and Cruelty
Summary: 5 Stars
This film is so extremely heart-warming throughout ... until the very end ... when it becomes exactly the opposite, heart-breaking. The story is completly absorbing and fascinating. The viewer is captivated and caught up in the lives of Mancho a young boy who begins school for the first time, his older brother who plays the saxophone who later finds a Chinese girl with whom he falls in love, his father a tailor, and his teacher Don Gregorio. The kind elderly teacher helps Mancho adjust in many ways by providing personalized individual attention. He helps open his mind to learning about nature and literature. Mancho has asthma and his mother worries about how this will affect her son during school. In one scene, Don Gregorio helps Mancho avert a respiratory crisis ... In gratitude for the help given to his son, Mancho's father makes a new suit for the teacher, free of charge. This innocent act will eventually be turned into something cruel and unexpected when the political climate of civil war causes the citizens to denounce each other ...
There are numerous endearing scenes between Mancho and Don Gregorio as the teacher mentors his young pupil. Mancho also learns many things about life and the world in the manner boys often learn, from friends. For example, he and his friend visit the local tavern where a male patron describes/brags to the local bartender about his physical love relationship with a local female. The two boys follow the patron to her home where they spy on their liason ... One of the funniest scenes is when the ladies dog, Tarzan tries to bite the boyfriend's naked butt as he is engaging in making love to her. The boyfriend is enraged by the dog and his constant barking and later exacts revenge in a very cruel manner ...
This film shows how fear and the threat of persecution can cause ordinairily good people to become cruel. It shows how the mob mentality takes over when one's own life is at stake. The sad fact is, it is the survival instinct which kicks in. It is something we all possess and very few people can rise above the crowd to do the moral and right thing ...
Erika Borsos (pepper flower)
Movie Review: A wonderful glimpse into life during a civil war.
Summary: 5 Stars
"Butterfly" is a wonderful glimpse of what life is/can be like for noncombatants during a civil war. I use the term "noncombatants" loosely here because as you go through the film that everyone is a combatant in some way, shape or form when civil war is going on around you: whose business do you support, who do you elect mayor and, perhaps most strikingly, what do you allow your kids to be taught in school? These are the questions that tear a small Spanish town apart at the seams during the Spanish Civil War in the mid-1920s. At the heart of the movie is a painfully shy boy who is mentored by a kind and open-minded teacher. Unfortunately, the politics of the town consipire against the two and, as the plot unfolds, the teacher and the boy must make choices that shape their futures.
This is a must see movie for anyone wanting to understand what can happen to reasonable and intelligent people when their beliefs and their families come under fire (literally). This movie is time very well spent.
Movie Review: Beautiful movie!
Summary: 5 Stars
Another reviewer lamented this film's "obscure metaphors." Here's a hint: there aren't any. No knowledge of Spanish history is needed to understand any part of this film besides the very end, and anyone who took world history should know that the fascists carted off everyone they didn't like at the beginning of the civil war. To say that the western world has forgotten the Spanish civil war is akin to saying that the western world has forgotten the holocaust, the only greater atrocity ever committed on European soil.But about the movie itself. The cinematography is beautiful, and the acting is excellent. The subtitles are for the hearing impared, which is a little annoying, but it's easy enough to ignore "[dog barks]." The only fault I can find with the film is that it tends to digress a little too much; there are several peripheral episodes that never really go anywhere. The soundtrack is amazing. Definitely one of the best movies to come out of Spain in a long time!
Movie Review: A Beautifully Produced Film
Summary: 5 Stars
A beautiful period piece of 1930s Spain in all its political unrest. The young actor who plays Moncho proves himself a brilliant actor, but is also so completely adorable that he would have made the movie had he never even spoken. So expressive and filled with unusual depth for a boy of his age. The story is tender, a precious and loving friendship between a yong boy and his aging teacher; and raw, not polished to answer all the questions or to leave the audience feeling good about everything. It demands the questions of the time.
In Spanish with English subtitles, but well done, so the subtitles don't get in the way of seeing the film. Rated R for language, violence, and sexual content.
Movie Review: sweet and moving
Summary: 5 Stars
The backdrop of "La Lengua de las Mariposas" is Spain just before the Spanish Civil War. On one level, it's a beautiful, touching story of a shy young boy and a warm older teacher. On another level, it's a tale of the loss of honesty of a village during difficult times.
There are so many themes in this movie - the warm love of a teacher for his students, the joy of a young child discovering the world, the complexity of the roles of the Catholic church, the intertwined realities of sexual relationships in a small village, the reactions of a crowd to military authority, etc.
This film is a wonderful painting using these themes as its palette. Highly recommended....