The Secret in Their Eyes (2009)

I wrote this for my recently defunct movie club as I was going to select this film as my pick for our third round. I wanted to share it somewhere, though, as I really, really liked it.

So, there's times when writing about things, i.e. (in this case) film criticism, feels, well, silly. I'm not going to come right out and "rank" this film alongside luminaries like The Godfather or Citizen Kane. Nor do I see any real reason for any film to be so stringently compared to films from the past. From my experiences it is one of the finest films I've had the pleasure of seeing. I do think its terrific, both in terms of its story and execution, and that brings me back to my opening point. I'd have a hard time writing about this movie from a cold, technical standpoint; for me, it was an emotional experience, and to spend a lot of time writing exposition about it doesn't seem as good an idea as just imploring others to actually see it themselves. Given the nature of this club I don't need to do that, you've all already saw it (hopefully!), so I'll just try to hit some of the main points and why I picked it and liked it so much.

For starters, I have a cache of films I'd planned on using from the start for this project. Films that I both think are genuinely good but that also, for whatever reason, belong in a short list of films that resonated with me and I hold dearly. My first two selections came from that list, and I'd anticipated my next several would, too. Then I saw this. Winning an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 2010 (would anybody else like to tackle a project where we watch all the Best Foreign Language Film winners as a separate, non-New Eyes project?) I added it to my queue of critically acclaimed films I felt I needed to see. Upon finishing it I immediately knew it's be my next pick, I felt obligated to share it with others, as I felt it was the personification of why film is so damn good, the tension, the drama, the acting, the storytelling, the appeals to the human condition, etc.

I started the movie on a night I was home alone with my son Owen. On those nights he's usually in bed by 10PM and I always go to bed at 1AM to assure I'll get at least some sleep. I only got to watch the first ten minutes or so but I couldn't get them out of my head when I laid down in my bed. I'm a sucker for falling for characters in films, and no, not in some trivial, lustful, idealized way. But I'll genuinely get attached to characters, truly empathizing with them, which makes the moviegoing experience that much more wonderful. This notion isn't exclusively given toward females, as it extends to males, too (take, for example, Eduardo Verástegui's wonderful turn as Jose in Alejandro Gomez Monteverde's Bella -- a film some could argue as preachy human melodrama I found deeply moving mostly due to his performance). I bring this up because I couldn't get the character of Liliana Coloto (played by the gorgeous Carla Quevedo in her first role) out my head while I laid there. We see her, bathed in sunlight, sitting at the kitchen table smiling, making tea for her sick husband, practically radiant in her natural beauty. Then we see her ravaged, nude and bloody, the victim of the most awful and personal of crimes, rape. For the short duration of time she gets on-screen she entered my brain and wouldn't leave. I'm not sure why I felt this was so important to share, but certainly, lying there in bed I lay restless, wanting to see the rest of the film, wanting to learn more about her case.

I don't want to tread into the plot, it has a lot of suspense and surprises, but I'd be doing a disservice plowing through it in a synopsis. I think the way I'd most enjoy talking about the film is examining a few of its key relationships, the chemistry two characters had together, etc.

Benjamín Esposito is the main character and many of the film's relationships involve him. There's his friendship with co-worker Pablo Sandoval which is great because of their on-screen chemistry. Sandoval is a fully fleshed out character, fiercely loyal, but also deeply imperfect, spending much of his time and money on his "passion", i.e. getting drunk. There's Esposito's relationship with the bereaved Ricardo Morales who lost the love of his life, the aforementioned Liliana. I found this particular relationship very interesting. Benjamín is not just taking the case, but develops a bond with Ricardo, one that's hard to articulate but is undeniable. He worries what will become of Morales, suffering internally such great grief and despair, sitting daily at train stations awaiting the prime suspect in his wife's rape/homicide case.

The main relationship however is between Benjamín Esposito and Irene Menéndez Hastings. It's got many, many layers. It starts innocently enough, at the workplace, Esposito aplomb, unable to ask her out on a date. Over the years it develops into something much richer and stronger. Esposito not only respects her, but has been longing for her so long, that so much is said while nothing's being said. The scene at the train station, well, that was his chance to divulge his inner-feelings, ones they both were implicitly aware of, but none were offered. Years later, they look back, why hadn't he spoken up? In the end, after seeing how Morales and murderer Isidoro Gómez ended up, he understands finally that you can't keep living in the past, all you'll end up with is memories, so he decides to finally take that stand and open his heart to Irene. On one of the special features on the DVD the director Juan José Campanella compares the film's dual stories as similar to a Beethoven sonata in structure, we've got theme #1, then theme #2, then we repeat (the themes or stories being detective and romance). It works out splendidly as both are deeply interwoven both on the surface and symbolically.

The camerawork is just fantastic. The scenes at the soccer field, the crane shot from the skyline all the way down into the stadium, plus the riveting chase sequence ending up on the field during a game itself, are just spellbinding and beautiful examples of splendid cinematography. Félix Monti has done a lot of work but this has got to be his finest stuff so far behind the lens. I think the title is appropriate as Esposito says in the film, the eyes speak, as do ours, they can reveal what we aren't saying. I'm a huge fan of watching and studying the eyes of performers, have been for awhile, and this film lends itself to that sort of micro attention to details as the performances are so damned good that they pull you in. I especially liked watching Irene and Benjamín's eyes during their scenes together, there was a lot of that going on, unspoken feelings, expectations, and so on, but you could read it on the way they looked at and listened to each other.

All in all, it floored me, reminded me of the beauty and the power of filmmaking. I'm not a huge crime guy, smaller, more personal stories are my bag, but this worked for me on every level imaginable. For what it's worth I'm still haunted by images of Liliana Coloto.