Search - Lagrimas Negras: Black Tears on DVD

Faces of Love

Grady Harp | Los Angeles, CA United States | 05/01/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"LAGRIMAS NEGRAS (Black Tears) is a disturbing film that examines the many facets and journeys that the spectrum of love can encompass. Director Fernando Bauluz uses a script by Ricardo Franco to create a film that reels with suspense, terror, and gothic romance. Andres (Fele Martinez) is a quiet photographer who is successful selling his nature photographs (though longing to say something more in his art) and is planning to marry Alicia (Elena Anaya), a beautiful girl with simple trusting ideals. Andres quiet life ends abruptly as two women who appear either to be druggies or psychotic rob him of his car, his money, and his camera. Though they appear to be 'desperadas', Isabel (Adriana Gil in yet another show stopping performance) decides to rape her victim while her girlfriend Cinta (Ana Resueno) looks on, smoking dope. Left without his belongings and barely having been killed, Andres finally recovers his car and camera and finds that Isabel is in reality a woman of wealth who has a baby daughter and a history of Psychiatric hospitalizations. As though fate had intervened, Andres falls in love with the schizophrenic Isabel and ends up fleeing the comfortable life and fiancée he had to flee with Isabel and Cinta to Portugal. There the romances unfold and the truths are out and the ending, well, that is the shocker of the film. This is a dark film that deals with explosive emotional scenes and attempts to give us insight into the mentally ill patients. In lesser hands, LAGRIMAS NEGRAS would be a poor soap opera, but the cast is uniformly excellent and the visual atmosphere is stunning. A fine film for those who don't mind the dark side of love."