purav mehta I grabbed this DVD from the library with not much of expectations. The reviews on the cover were definitely convincing,but it is expected that no one will trash their own film. Having said that,i haven't seen the cover of "The Room". Surprisingly,the end result turned out to be a good,light comedy which was engaging till the end.The movie tries to solve every puzzle and clears fog over many issues that stems while watching it. The opening short is a bit bizarre but the story is narrated in a beautiful manner to join the dots. Being a Wes Anderson fan,the small things about characters fascinates me and for a movie romantics,this film has loads of small bits which are likable and pivotal in the story-line. I enjoyed the movie and would recommend to anyone who is looking for a light comedy instead of wasting time elsewhere. Enjoy the movie.

estebangonzalez10 ¨I've got a Chinese guy living in my house who doesn't speak a word of Spanish.¨Ricardo Darín has starred in two of my favorite Argentine films: El Secreto de Sus Ojos and Nueve Reinas. Darín is a great actor and he has proved he can do very different roles and manage them well. In this film he plays a quiet grumpy and lonely man whose life turns around when an unexpected visitor changes his every day routine. Un Cuento Chino was written and directed by Sebastian Borensztein, a director I wasn't familiar with until now. He has made a well crafted film by mixing the right amount of comedy with drama. The movie shines thanks to the original script and Darín's performance, along with two good supporting performances from unknown actors Muriel Santa Ana and Ignacio Huang. The film claims to be based on a true story, but actually it is just loosely based on an unexpected incident which had to do with a cow falling from the sky and sinking a Japanese ship. This story actually begins with a Chinese couple in a River who are interrupted when a cow falls from the sky. From that moment on you know that you are in for a very different movie, but there is a perfect explanation for the event. The cow falling from the sky is the only true event about this movie which is a fictionalization about a relationship between this lonely man played by Ricardo Darín and a Chinese immigrant in Argentina. Their failure to communicate is what makes this film so funny.Roberto (Ricardo Darin) is a hardware store owner who lives on his own in the city of Buenos Aires. He is very grumpy and always complaining, but also seems to live a very quiet and routine life. His house is behind the store so he spends most of his time indoors keeping to his self and collecting newspaper clips of bizarre and rare stories in order to prove that life is meaningless. He goes to bed exactly at 11pm and wakes up the next morning to the same breakfast: coffee and bread. He seems comfortable living on his own. He seems to have had a short relationship with the sister in law of the person who always brings him the international newspapers. Her name is Mari (Muriel Santa Ana) and she lives in the countryside far from Buenos Aires, but happens to be visiting again and is very much in love with Roberto. His life changes when he runs into a Chinese immigrant named Jun (Ignacio Huang) who is thrown out of a cab after being mugged. Jun has nowhere to go and doesn't speak Spanish so Roberto decides to help him. He takes Jun to the address he has tattooed on his arm, but the person living there claims that a Chinese man sold the house to him several years ago. Roberto takes Jun to the Chinese Embassy where Jun can finally communicate his intentions: He has come to Argentina to find his uncle since he is the only family he has left. Despite the inconvenience Roberto decides to take Jun in for a few days until his uncle shows up. This will change Roberto's routine and affect his life.Darin's character might be grumpy and mean, but he is also nice and has a big enough heart to accommodate a foreigner into his home. He will never expect how this relationship will dramatically change his life, but this relationship is exactly what makes the story work. There are other funny moments like some of the paper clips that Roberto finds and how he recreates those bizarre events in his mind, but the center of the story revolves around him, Jun, and Mari. The story moves slow at times, but it works really well because it shows us exactly how Roberto lived before Jun shows up. Once Jun is with Roberto everything changes and that is what makes for the funniest moments. Un Cuento Chino is a very rare film, but a good one with memorable characters and an unlikely pairing between Darin and Huang that works really well. The film has a feel good feeling to it and once the credits begin to role it's impossible not to leave with a smile in your face. I absolutely recommend this movie which won Best Argentine Film and the Goya for Best Iberoamerican Film in 2011. http://estebueno10.blogspot.com

ar656 With a few days apart I just saw this movie, and another one from Argentina also: "Las Acacias." Both deal with lone wolves Argentine middle age males, who find themselves in a situation where they can give a hand to a foreigner in distress. Both characters are very reluctant to do so, until both witness the treatment these two immigrants get from the police or border agents. At that time, like kicked into action by the either racism, or just plain indifference by authorities in uniform, the protagonists feel the need to assert they are NOTHING like the guy in uniform.In Las Acacias many have already highlighted the performance given by a baby a few months old. Justly so. How did the director managed to get this kind of acting from someone who neither speaks nor understand spoken language? I do not know, but he did it, and on the shoulders of three magnificent performances this movie achieves what others costing many times more can only hope. Incidentally, the name of the film in Spanish, "Cuento Chino", literally means "Chinese tale", but in Spanish means a story that is very hard to believe.

jotix100 Jun, a Chinese man, is seen with his would be wife on a boat. The setting serves as a romantic place in which he will propose marriage to her. Unfortunately, fate intervenes in the way of a cow falling from the sky, killing the woman and ending his aspirations.The scene changes to a contemporary hardware store in Buenos Aires where Roberto, the owner, is counting screws. Instead of the number specified in the box, Roberto has been gypped, something, he notices, that occurs all the time. He curses the company that cannot even count right. He is a man of few words who does not take kindly to idiots that come into his shop. One thing Roberto loves is to cut articles from newspapers with bizarre stories. The best are pasted on an album he keeps.One day, a Chinese man arrives at the store. It is Jun, the Chinese man we saw first. He has come looking for a relative, whose address he was given, is the one where the De Cesare's Hardware is located. Roberto does not understand a thing Jun is trying to tell him, and vice-versa. Since Jun has no place to go, and not acquainted with the city, he stays close to Roberto's shop. Roberto takes pity on the poor Jun by taking him to the embassy, where they promise to contact Jun's relatives. Roberto has a friend, Mari, who sees in the foreigner a man to be pitied having come from so far away to an uncertain future. Mari is also interested in Roberto in a more romantic way, although he seems oblivious to the way she looks at him.Through his newspaper clippings, we get to know a little bit of Roberto's life and his involvement in the Falklands war. There is an article that shows a young Roberto and the tragedy the country suffered plus the humiliation afterward, something that can explain his strange behavior. Trying to get Jun occupied, Roberto asks Jun to paint his patio. Roberto is in for a big surprise after Jun leaves, having found his distant uncle, by what Jun decided to paint on his wall!An interesting film from Argentina, written and directed by Sebastian Borensztein, the son of well known and witty comedian Tato Bores. The film works in unexpected ways because it is a comedy with an important message sandwiched in between. The title refers to the kind of stories that are so far fetched, they are not true. Roberto lives through exactly that, stories that are so incredible, that he puts himself in them, trying to make sense to escape his lonely existence.One could not imagine what the film might have been without the great Ricardo Darin playing Roberto. The actor is without a doubt one of the best actors working today. The intelligence of Mr. Darin permeates everything he does; he is no one other than Roberto, the strange shop owner facing a dilemma about what to do with his life. Ignacio Huang plays Jun and Muriel Santa Ana is Mari.