braddugg A terrific film that raises the spirit of a revolutionary to the hilt.This movie is a 2 part biopic that runs nearly four and a half hours. When I saw it for the first time at home on in 2009, I just took a ten-minute break after the completion of the first part and was dying to start the second part. After finishing the movie viewing, I was overwhelmed. I was very happy; there is an inspiration that I must make my life worth before I die. There is an incentive to value life.Ernesto Che Guevara is one of the most inspirational revolutionaries of the centuries the world over. The way he organized and won guerrilla wars was something that was a shock to many regimes in the American continents. The depiction of Che by Benicio Del Toro is something that took me by a surprise. Benicio Del Toro was intrepid in playing Che. Never did I feel, I was seeing an actor, all through it was just Che.The makeup was superlative. For the first ten minutes of the second part of the film, I was stunned. I could not recognize who is playing the character. So right is the disguise and so great is the acting. Cinematography and art direction in this could be used as references for generations to come. The film took me into 1950's and 1960's and made live in those times.From the word go to the last frame, there is perfection in craft technically. The spirit of revolution is in place. Cuba, Fidel Castro, Revolution, Bolivia, UN conference, Che, wow so many overwhelming elements.Kudos to Steven Soderbergh and perhaps this is his finest effort. Also to Benicio Del Toro. Benicio, you will live on as Che forever.A 5/5 for my favorite revolutionary films. One of the all-time great films this.

Armand and almost, correct. portrait of a character, it becomes a poem. an eulogy with flavor of Hollywood war films. it is not a sin because each director makes his choices. and, in this case, the not inspired political ideas are important but the art to create a film who present not only images but has desire to give a testimony. so, a problem of courage. and extraordinary occasion for Benicio Del Toro to do a magnificent role. OK, in many parts it is a sentimental lesson. but the measure is not broken. the realism of fight for conquest of power, the good acting and the force of images are real virtues. it is not exactly propaganda but it has not a profound vision about root of events. but it is impressive and that is relevant.

nzallblacks_12 Be warned: I broach him, the historical CHE figure with mucho respect. I can't say the same for the characterization for the same man in this film though the actor, Benicio del Torro gave a gutsy and possibly a memorable performance.Right from the get-go, director Steven Soderbergh set me at odds with his brand of directing. Then there's the even weightier matter of his much revisionist views of the period's history: Coups BAD but Revolucion by Armed Struggle is VERY GOOD. Of course, they the Revolucionarios had the blessing of the people every which way they killed. And why such foreplay with the (RED) map of Kuba? Was that even necessary? One might assume that theatergoers would at the very least have a rudimentary knowledge of the Cubanos' struggles from the 50s. For sure, I don't believe many folk under the age of 50 viewed this film. So spare us the leftist pictographs history lesson.Since my youth, I've always been interested in knowing more about this appropriately bearded, somewhat charismatic Argentine medical doctor who quickly became Fidel Castro's right, er, left hand man in the struggles before and after that led to the overthrow of the corrupt Batista regime in Kuba. Thereafter I saw the gruesome photos from Life magazine which revealed the murdered corpse of the now infamous named CHE after Columbian troops (I suspect CIA fed)tracked then cut down like a wild animal in those dense jungles where normally men such as Ernesto and other peoples'liberation fighters get their start, I needed to know the truth.Really, I wanted to believe that the film was based on the true writings of the humble but famous Ernesto man himself. Well, that youthful naivete and my perennial optimism went fleeting, fast. To wit, the moment I heard that banal-tone mesmerizing, though totally grating voice of the female U.S. State Department spokesperson and interviewer, I knew the leftist jig was at work (excuse the pun).Right there I knew that this was indeed CNN 'deja vu' all over again though in retrofit fashion and much redux.I gave up on learning more. Still I viewed with much suspicion maybe skepticism for two whole hours until PART One concluded. What a relief!NO, not even for a New York minute did I consider loading PART Two in the beckoning DVD orifice. I'm not a masochist, nor am I nuts. For sure I am not all enamored nor influenced by the Left's love-fest with this famous man, Ernesto Che Guevara. However I will give him this: Despite his ideology I believe he showed much compassion for the poor at anytime even in the heat of battle. For that quality alone, I believe his soul found redemption and his battle against injustice, finally won.So, the ideological debate no doubt continues and my earnest search to learn the 'real truth' behind or before the making of Ernesto CHE Guevara marches further afield into the future. Still, I know this: This film certainly shed little if any light on that subject. Oh yes, I almost forgot. The director and the imaginary, cellophane CHE depicted in PART One did remind us often of his and Ernesto's, but not so much Fidel's motivation to commit to armed struggle: U.S. hegemony, better enunciated as Yankee Imperialism was running amok in the lesser known 'Little Americas'. If allowed to go unchecked, why soon the entire world would behave like a domino factory, then fall and fail, subsequently beholden to American capitalism. Moreover, each country touched by U.S. expansionists soon becomes a slave colony working tirelessly to run up a deficit which totally suits the American masters. Fidel said so himself (in private).OK. I got it. Some of that may be true. However, I found it odd that the film's message failed and was too remiss to mention even once that the other side of the Post WWII cold fission/fusion process, the Russians,were doing much the same thing, although in covert and on the flip side of the globe. Surprise...!To be fair, CHE and I believe his big boss Castro did mumble the dirty word 'Stalinist' once though they did so en passant.Sigh, to hear their muted act of contrition was not worth two hours of my time. It is apropros then that none of them get cinematic nor even mine absolution.One Star it is and no more.Sorry...

geoffreybaker Listen: I LIKE ERNESTO GUEVARA. I LIKE ALL THE ACTORS. I LIKE SODEBERBERG.So why was this movie so absolutely, completely awful? Ever seen a movie over four hours long where at the end you feel like you know NOTHING about the hero? Ever seen a movie that plods along so slowly that you're begging for it to end... and yet despite all the time and detail, so much is still so inexplicable? If you are a fan or Che or revolutionary politics, go see The Motorcycle Diaries; Che comes across as young, brash, vibrant, idealistic, fun... you feel you know him.This movie, I'm afraid, is essentially retelling, page by awful page, the complete diary of Ernesto Guevara over a period of many years, without bothering to edit, explain, highlight or detail any one page over another. The tedious Marxist verbiage is repeated line for line as Che explains to one comrade or another the essence of the armed struggle; the long, slow daily boring grind of what its like to hide out in the jungle for months at a time is lovingly recreated...This movie needed an EDITOR!!!! Some SNAPPY DIALOGUE!!!! A DECENT SCORE!!! I apologize to all the Che fans out there who probably feel this endless tripe was a loving recreation of his life... but it wasn't... it was merely as exciting as if Steven Soderberg stood in your living room for five hours and READ you Che's diary, in a flat, even monotone.That's how boring it was. Using the same technique, you could turn the greatest stories ever told into unwatchable muck. The truth is that diaries are not good stories, by themselves. You have to figure out which are the exciting parts and which aren't. You have to punch up the dialog a bit beyond the "Then I told my comrade that the revolutionary struggle begins with the armed struggle, that the people cannot support us without understanding the nature of the Marxist dialectic through the viewpoint of a semi-feudal dictatorship...blah blah..." Listen, I KNOW Che was a lot more interesting that that. But sadly Soderberg doesn't bring him out... he hides him.You watch helplessly as Che and his revolutionary brothers in the second movie slowly starve to death as they hide in the jungle, forgetting, apparently, that to have an armed struggle you have to occasionally meet up with other people to struggle with. In retrospect, Che's entire Bolivian foray was probably the worst revolutionary decision ever made, and virtually suicidal; to enter a foreign country, hide in the vast jungle and then expect that somehow you will get the people in the cities, in industry, and on the farms to all join you and your foreign revolutionary brethren from Cuba and Panama and France and England ... but enough on Che's mistakes; let's get back to Soderbergs.The music was simply awful. Long irritating passages of near random noise just got in the way of what little development and action that might be occurring on screen.The dialog was similarly inept. Although better in the first movie, by the time the second rolls around, what little dialog there is is exceptionally wooden.Lastly, about two and a half hours of this movie should never have made it off the cutting room floor. We just didn't need to see the endless trekking through the jungle. The unbelievably slow buildups to most actual action could have been cut in half.Why did Matt Damon show up as a local village elder for a scene lasting under sixty seconds? That annoyed me.I would love to see a good movie about Che that really brings out the man behind the myth. How can you possibly, as Che II does, never mention except once that Che had a wife and five children? Because I really would like to a great movie about Che, and The Motorcycle Diaries would make a good start. I'd pay to see The Motorcycle Diaries Part II and Part III.But Soderberg's Che? Sadly, he comes across as nothing more than the icon we already know... a black and white image, easily silk-screened onto T-shirts.You learn nothing else. In five hours.