Karry Best movie of this year hands down!

Micitype Pretty Good

Forumrxes Yo, there's no way for me to review this film without saying, take your *insert ethnicity + "ass" here* to see this film,like now. You have to see it in order to know what you're really messing with.

Ella-May O'Brien Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

santiagocosme The movie unfolds in Argentina where a family owns a small hotel and struggles to make ends meet. One day, a friendly German appears in their lives and wishes to stay for an undefined period with them. As soon as he gets there, he slowly tries to gain the hosts' trust by taking care of their health as if he was a family doctor. However, what lies behind these good intentions is simply a thirst to continue with the experiments he conducted during the second world war for the Germans. The man in question is not just anyone. His name is Josef Mengele, the German doctor who is being hunted by the whole world. Slowly and steadily, the family are forced to rethink the whole situation and wonder whether to get rid of the German doctor who seems to be better connected than one could imagine.

Larry Silverstein This Argentinian drama, written and directed by Lucia Puenzo, based on her novel "Wakolda", maintains a great deal of creepiness and subtle tension throughout. There are also lots of fine and realistic performances by pretty much the entire cast here.Set in 1960, in the Argentine city of Bariloche, Alex Brendemuhl leads the way here with a understated and chilling performance as Helmut Gregor, a German refugee and physician, and whom we slowly learn may indeed be Josef Mengele, aka "The Angel of Death", for his atrocities and human experiments at the Auschwitz death camp during WW2.He begins to utilize every opportunity to ingratiate himself with an Argentinian family, who are trying to reopen a hotel, in Bariloche, that was bequeathed to them by a recently deceased family member. The family consists of the father Enzo (Diego Paretti), the mother Eva (Natalia Oreiro), their daughter Lilith (Florencia Bado), who by the way is remarkable in her screen debut, and Lilith's two brothers Tomas and Polo.Lilith is quite small for a 12-year-old girl, and is being bullied and harassed by her classmates at her new school. She'll become a particular target for the doctor, as he tries to convince her parents that he can help her to grow with an experimental hormone treatment. Lilith and Eva are receptive to his offers , but Enzo is wisely suspicious of the doctor's intentions from the very start. The doctor even tries to win over Enzo by investing in his part-time doll making business.However, when a local archivist and photographer at the school, Nora Eldoc (Elena Roger), who may also be acting as an Isreali Mossad agent, spots the doctor, she quickly discovers he may indeed be Mengele. Tensions will quickly grow in the town, which is filled with Nazi sympathizers, who even celebrate the birth date of Hitler each year. Things will reach a boiling point when the doctor gets involved in the care of treatment of Eva's newly born twins.In summary, although there were some plot details that didn't quite add up near the end, I felt overall this movie was very engrossing and, as mentioned, maintained a tone of tension throughout and I would say is certainly worth a watch. By the way, just to mention the cinematography outside of the hotel, with the beautiful lake at the base of the snow capped Andes mountains was truly spectacular.

jkbonner1 This is one of the best movies I've seen in quite a while. Although the Argentinian family in the movie is fictitious, there is much truth about the movie. It takes place in and around the city of San Carlos de Bariloche (aka simply Bariloche) in Argentinian Patagonia.Bariloche had a large contingent of German immigrants long before World War II and it was a recognized haven for Nazi war criminals after the War. It is also one of the most beautiful parts of Argentina known for its snow-capped mountains and Lake Nahuel Huapi, all of which are splendidly shown in the movie. There was even a rumor floating around at one time that Adolf Hitler and his mistress/wife, Eva Braun, lived there after the War.The Angel of Death is of course the infamous Dr. Josef Mengele (1911-1979?), chief SS staff physician at the notorious Auschwitz-Birkenau labor/death camp from early 1943 to early 1945. What makes Mengele so heinous were his genetic experiments, particularly on twins and dwarfs. He was also involved in making the decision at the camp as to who would be used for labor and who would be sent to the gas chamber and certain death. Reading even a bit about his life will quickly convince you he was a true psychopath.The movie opens in 1960. Mengele (Àlex Brendemühl)―known by his pseudonym Helmut Gregor―is traveling to Bariloche along a lone, unpaved road where he encounters an Argentinian family: Enzo (Diego Peretti), Eva (Natalia Oreiro), Lilith (Florencia Bado), and their teenage son. Gregor/Mengele notices that Lilith, twelve, is very short for her age. Although he is very friendly with her, you can see the wheels turning in his head that she would make an excellent subject for one of his experiments. BTW Bado in her first film role does an outstanding job portraying the intelligent, but vulnerable, Lilith. Even at this early stage Enzo subconsciously picks up on Gregor/Mengele as a threat to his family, but since he has nothing overt to go on, lets Gregor/Mengele follow him on the unpaved road toward Bariloche. Eva is of German descent but born in Argentina. She has learned German at a private school in Bariloche run by Germans for German Argentinians. The family plans to restore a resort hotel and Gregor/Mengele volunteers to become their first paying guest. Soon he is injecting hormones into Lilith with Eva's consent in an attempt to make her grow. This is despite Enzo warning Eva that she is specifically not to let Gregor/Mengele perform any experiments on Lilith without his consent. Eva is also pregnant with twins and soon lets Gregor/Mengele begin experimenting with her preborn children. Lilith becomes a student at the private school in Bariloche that her mother attended. She is befriended by a young photographer there, Nora Eldoc (Elena Roger). Eldoc recognizes Gregor as Mengele, confronts him, and shows the evidence of his experiments on Lilith and the twins. Eldoc has also reported his whereabouts, making it necessary for him to flee Argentina. For this he tells her in effect she will soon be murdered.The story ends with Eva realizing what a horrible mistake she has made by allowing Gregor/Mengele to treat her while pregnant and to treat Lilith. One of her twins is born with bad health from Gregor/Mengele's genetic/hormonal experimentation and Lilith may suffer from the injection of too much growth hormone for the rest of her life. At the very end we see a small seaplane flying off to Paraguay carrying Gregor/Mengele escaping the long arm of Mossad. The next day Eldoc is discovered in a cave in the mountains, dead, just as Gregor/Mengele has insinuated.Nora Eldoc was a real person who was an undercover Israeli agent in Bariloche who was murdered as described above. Although fictitious, the movie is supported by a solid bed of facts. There are subtleties in the movie I have neglected in order to keep this review manageable―such as the significance of the porcelain dolls, Gregor/Mengele's detailed notes of his experiments and his fascination with measurement, the abject respect many of the German Argentinians display towards Gregor/Mengele, and Eva's conflicts with Enzo. The acting's outstanding as is the cinematography. Written and directed by Lucía Puenzo.This movie ought to win some awards. I saw it at Laemmle's Playhouse 7 in Pasadena, California USA. The theater was not very crowded. Unfortunately this movie will probably not attract a large audience. This is a real shame because it really should be seen. And it should be seen because Mengele was a monster in reality and he truly existed. And he truly and habitually did the things that the movie depicts him doing. That such a person can really exist should be a lot more frightening than vampires and zombies.10/10

Nathan L A stranger, with a foreign accent, asks if he can follow a family on the road towards the South. The father agrees, though everyone look at him warily. Everyone but Lilith, the 12 year-old girl who looks 8, fascinated by this man fixing his gaze on her.Lucia Puenzo is known for exploring difficult and unusual relationships, and this particular feature makes her movies quite appealing. Add to that, beautiful landscapes, solid directing and you've got one of the best thrillers of 2013.Also interesting to see, the way South America coped with ex-NSDAP members and how they continued to live and work amidst general indifference. Some things seem like never ending, and as such this movie truly acts like a spell.