October 21, 2015 -- While performing Shakespeare's “Love's Labour's Lost” a group of young friends experience romantic entanglements similar to those in the play they are performing. Despite the title, this is not a French movie (the title comes from a character in the play). This is an Argentinean film, directed by Matías Piñeiro.

I found this film hard to follow because I had not read “Love's Labour's Lost” before watching the film. I also don't speak Spanish, so I had to rely on the subtitles to follow what was going on. The subtitles fly by really fast, because the people speak very rapidly, squeezing a lot of words into a short time period. Fortunately, I was able to pause and reverse the video when I needed to in order to catch everything, but I still ended up reading subtitles more than watching what was going on, because this film is very heavy on rapid dialog and it is short. The film runs only a little over an hour, and the real meat of the story is squeezed into about 40 minutes.

The film introduces us to the players formally, as in the program to a stage play. There is Victor, the actor (played by Julián Larquier Tellarini) who is like the king in this version of the story. All the action circles around him because he is staging the play and he decides who is in it and what roles they play. He is also the central thread in several romantic entanglements.

Paula (Agustina Muñoz) is Victor's girlfriend, but he's been away for a year, and she's having an affair with Guillermo (Pablo Sigal) his unfaithful friend. Then there is Victor's former girlfriend, Natalia (Romina Paula) who is broke and doesn't get much respect. There is also Ana, the lover (María Villar) who further complicates things, Jimena, a betrayed girlfriend (Gabriela Saidon) another friend, Lorena (Laura Peredes) and Carla, a stranger (Elisa Caricajo).

Victor has secured enough funding during his stay in Mexico to back a Spanish language radio version of Love's Labour's Lost. Natalia hears of this and wants a part in the play, but Victor has cast another in the role she is most familiar with. Natalia wants to discuss this with them, but her friends keep her out of the loop in one alternate version of this scene. This film features several alternate versions of scenes, further complicating the story. Most of these alternate scenes are about Natalia's efforts to be cast in the play. In some versions of these scenes, people are quite rude to Natalia. In others, people are more friendly, and everyone, including Natalia, behave more reasonably in some.

One key element in the story is a note written by Ana to Victor about their brief romantic fling. She inserts the note into the pages of a book. The note seems to end up being read by everyone but the person for whom it was intended. Paula has determined to tell Victor about her decision to leave him, but waffles when she finally faces him. This further complicates things. Victor has sworn off love for the duration of the play, but you know how that goes.

As Woody Allen once wrote, everyone says I love you, but how many people mean it? In this play, love is a word thrown around a lot and there is a tremendous amount of kissing and hugging (but no sex). When people are young, they think love is readily available and it will always come around again, but it turns out you can't depend on it. True love is pretty elusive in this story, too. This film rates a C.

Click here for links to places to buy or rent this movie in digital formats, or to buy the soundtrack, posters, books, even used videos, games, electronics and lots of other stuff. I suggest you shop at least two of these places before buying anything. Prices seem to vary continuously. For more information on this film, click on this link to The Internet Movie Database. Type in the name of the movie in the search box and press enter. You will be able to find background information on the film, the actors, and links to much more information.

Copyright © 2015 Robert Roten. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.

Robert Roten can be reached via e-mail at .