Begin the Beguine (1982)
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Begin the Beguine Movie Review
Begin the Beguine is a 1982 Spanish film directed by Jose Luis Garci and starring Antonio Ferrandis. It’s such a weak Oscar winner.
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“We’ll spend the night together like wanton lovers“
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The film follows a Spaniard who returns home after many years in exile just as he’s won the Nobel Prize in literature. The story here is slight beyond words. So basically it follows this older man who returns home, has a reunion with the love of his life and the two spend many hours walking and having conversations about life etcetera.
Needless to say, that story led to a very boring film which is incredibly short at around eighty minutes, but still that short runtime didn’t stop it from being very dull to watch and I was bored to death. Yes, some scenes between the two are very charming and romantic and some of the dialogue was sweet, but for the most part the scenes here last way too much and aren’t particularly memorable.
The main character is okay, but needed better development. The same goes for the woman. The two are endearing together, but individually they are underutilized. The acting is pretty good as both Antonio Ferrandis and Encarna Paso did a good job in their roles. The movie, however, needed more characters and more drama in it.
Begin the Beguine is pretty well shot and some scenes by the water are quite moving and well established, but the movie relies way too much on monotonous walking around and doing nothing. It is the typical “artsie” foreign flick which actually isn’t artistic truly, but more in the fake manner. It is also poorly paced and so weakly directed by Jose Luis Garci, though the score definitely is pretty solid.
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This is one of those movies which shamefully won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film and are entirely forgotten today which should be the case as the film just screams forgettable. But it came out in a weaker year for foreign films and it thus walked away with a statue unfortunately, but still its win should not be justified.
Begin the Beguine is one of the most forgettable foreign Oscar winners which just screams forgettable with its very slight story and slow pace. It has its endearing moments and it’s well shot and scored, but it needed more drama in it as the story is immensely boring and uneventful leading to a total waste of time.
