She Said/He Said:
The Secret in their Eyes
By Caroline Thibodeaux
June 24, 2010
BoxOfficeProphets.com
“I can’t and I won’t go see another bad movie. I’m just not doing it. I can’t! Nothing’s been awesome since Crazy Heart!”
“What about Iron Man 2? Didn’t you enjoy that?”
“Yeah, but you know what I mean. I want to see…something…with more substance, something not so fluffy.”
“RDJ dancing around drunkenly in his armor didn’t do it for you? I thought that was hot.”
“Grrrr…”
“Okay, then what movie do you want to write about?”
“Hmm…what’s playing at the arthouse?”
“Human Centipede. And the answer is no.”
“Well what else is out there?”
We took a moment to scan the interwebs and I saw that The Secret in Their Eyes was playing in Brookline. I told the BD that I’d heard some really good things about this one and mentioned that not only had it won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film, but the feeling among the cinematic cognoscenti was that it may have actually even deserved it. No small feat, that. And no, I didn’t use those words exactly, but I was still pretty jazzed about going to see it. I was also jazzed about the possibility of hitting that cute Japanese restaurant around the corner from the theater afterwards, but I hungrily digress…
The film’s screenplay is adapted from the novel La Pregunta de Sus Ojos (The Question in Their Eyes) by Eduardo Sacheri. A co-production between Argentina and Spain and set in Argentina, Juan Jose Campanella returned from the US to make this film with his muse/actor-friend Ricardo Darin. Their fourth collaboration, Campanella previously directed multiple episodes of “House” and “Law and Order”.
This film is truly an unexpected treat and it more than surpassed my anticipation for it. It is all at once a procedural crime drama, a treatise on the politics and class system in Argentina and an unrequited love story which still finds time to be a buddy comedy. Told in flashback, flash-forward and sideways (you’ll always know which period you’re watching just by looking at the hair.), Darin plays Benjamin Esposito, a retired court investigator and civil servant with time on his hands who in 1999 decides to write a novel based on a particularly difficult criminal investigation from his past. In 1974, his office is assigned to investigate the brutal rape and murder of a beautiful young woman named Liliana Colotto.
Esposito becomes personally enmeshed in the case, promising justice to grieving widower Ricardo Morales (Pablo Rago). Esposito’s dogged pursuit of the culprit is mightily hindered by the apathy and incompetence of a seriously crooked court system. He also has trouble disentangling himself from his team of investigators. His close friend and direct report Pablo Sandoval (famed Argentine comic Guillermo Francella) is actually a crack investigator and observer of human behavior. The talented Sandoval should probably be much further along in his career but for the fact that he drinks himself into smashed oblivion every single day of his life. It often falls to Esposito to drag a pissed and broken Sandoval out of his normal watering hole and sometimes at the most inopportune times. Further complicating the investigation and Esposito’s life is his superior Irene Menendez-Hastings (Soledad Villamil). Irene is younger and richer than Esposito. She’s Ivy-league educated, engaged to marry someone suitable from her social class and she’s Esposito’s boss. She is absolutely unattainable and out of his league so of course, Esposito is hopelessly in love with her.
The entire cast delivers wonderfully affecting and gorgeous performances and Campanella takes such good care of them throughout their portrayals. The way he frames Esposito and Irene as they look at each other - the audience is so close you almost believe you can feel them breathing on each other, but strangely enough, as you’re drawn in that deeply, you don’t feel as though you’re intruding. It’s refreshing to see their profound and mature love portrayed on screen as Campanella insures us their eyes have no secrets at all. There are sublime moments where Francella is allowed to just cut loose and go as far as he wants to go – but he never does so in a silly way that would disrespect the tone of the film and the rest of the action. In those instances the audience finds themselves cracking up as the irreverent drunk Sandoval truly extends himself while methodically solving the crime. (Don’t worry – it’s not a murder mystery. Nothing is spoiled here.)
As lovely as the performances and direction are, perhaps the strongest elements of this film are the screenplay and the characterizations as written. Never pedestrian, insulting or clichéd – it was a joy to be led along back and forth through Esposito’s journey. I was amazed by how effortlessly all the genres within the film blended and how easily the story unfolded as it jumped back and forth through time. None of the moments ever seemed false or overwrought - even with some weighty symbolism strewn throughout for good measure. The characters all display such a genuine and elegant earthiness. The themes are heady and provocative, but in a satisfyingly cerebral way. Craft as splendid as this is a very rare thing in movies these days. I never wanted to leave the world of this film.
So if you’re in the mood for a beautifully constructed, well-acted and well-written film, go to your local arthouse theatre and get in on the Secret. Hopefully it’s playing there. If it’s not playing in your area, call the local movie multi-googolplex and ask why. I’m sure they could find space for it. And I bet you a spicy tuna roll and a bowl of miso soup that it won’t kill them to have one less screen playing Marmaduke.