100
San Francisco Chronicle by Jonathan Curiel
A sensitively wrought work.
Machuca
Critic Rating
(read reviews)User Rating
- Chile,
- Spain,
- United Kingdom,
- France
- 2004
- · 121m
Director
Andrés Wood
Cast
Matías Quer,
Ariel Mateluna,
Aline Küppenheim,
Ernesto Malbran,
Federico Luppi,
Manuela Martelli
Genre
Drama
Set during Salvador Allende's controversial presidency, slum-raised Pedro Machuca gets a full-ride scholarship to an elite Catholic boarding school run by progressive Father McEnroe. With budding friendships, political drama, and social tension, a portrait of youth life during the political upheavals of 1970s Chile is revealed.
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What are critics saying?
88
New York Post
You don't have to know Chile's bloody history to be moved by the poignant new film Machuca, the first movie made by a Chilean about the country's 1973 military coup.
88
New York Daily News by Jack Mathews
An astonishingly intimate and painful coming-of-age story.
88
New York Post by Russell Scott Smith
You don't have to know Chile's bloody history to be moved by the poignant new film Machuca, the first movie made by a Chilean about the country's 1973 military coup.
88
Chicago Tribune by Michael Wilmington
A fine, exciting film that makes a bloody historical event live all over again by showing it through the eyes of children on the edges of the conflict.
83
Seattle Post-Intelligencer by Bill White
Machuca is a quiet film, moving sadly toward its inevitable climax, the final scenes a lesson in the methods by which the military restores order to a divided country.
80
Los Angeles Times by Kenneth Turan
One of those special films that broadens and deepens as it goes on.
80
Salon by Andrew O'Hehir
Wood's film works, first and foremost, as a powerful character drama; it's not trying to teach historical or ideological lessons.
80
Variety by David Rooney
Richly human in focus, the drama steadily cranks up its political and emotional charge.
80
The Hollywood Reporter by Michael Rechtshaffen
Packs a quiet wallop.
80
Wall Street Journal by Joe Morgenstern
Tender, funny and smart, Machuca is that rare discovery, an incisive political parable that also succeeds as a drama of sharply drawn individuals.
70
TV Guide Magazine by Ken Fox
Wood's drama packs an emotional gut-punch that's all the more devastating for its being rooted in a dreadful historical reality.
70
The New York Times by Dana Stevens
Both sweet and stringent, attuned to the wonders of childhood as well as its cruelty and terror.
70
The A.V. Club by Keith Phipps
Though Machuca ultimately doesn't shy away from taking sides, it wisely keeps the focus on the human element. The politics take place in the background until they demand the foreground.
60
Village Voice by Michael Atkinson
Machuca is still a half-measure. Wood is fastidious about period set design, but not much else; rather than burning with experience, the film feels opportunistic.
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