FICCO Mexico City 2009

I have no words.

Picture two groups of siblings (cousins) alone in an adult-free country club for a week. Interesting, huh?

A beautifully shot social experiment. You can cut the sexual tension with a butter knife and drool all over the gorgeous cinematography.

Also, incredible performance from the teen cast. Amazing group of non-professional actors.

I was nearly peeing my pants in excitement: my first mumblecore film... on a theatre in Mexico City! After hanging out with Joe Swanberg for a couple of days!

I expected the movie to be all the things my dreams are made of, but it just blew me away and destroyed my expectations by going beyond them by many miles.

Deep, raw, emotional, cute, hilarious, depressing, extraordinary performances and a beautiful cinematography.

Some genius moments (the opening sequence is one of the funniest sex scenes I've ever seen and the banana conversation was simply wonderful) and a painful ending, Nights and Weekends was everything I asked for, and more.

One of those movies you're extremely proud to say: "It was as good as they said..." and maybe, even more.

While the whole music score was a little bit over the top, the entire screenplay was beautiful and intense.

Lina Leandersson devours the entire role by actually feeling like a 12 year old that may have lived over a 100 years of experiences and pain. She's hypnotizing and plays her role flawlessly, while Kare Hedebrant is just the cutest, skinniest boy ever. You just feel like hugging him til his eyes explode.

Probably, the cutest, nicest, most charming characters in contemporary filmmaking. A modern day Amélie with cleptomania and a cheap apartment in New York.

Indie cinema at its best.

Tour-de-force is such a small word to describe Daniel Hendler's performance here. There isn't any word able to fully describe the power of his eyes, his voice, his body language, the ability he has to deeply swim in his characters' mind and soul. In this extraordinary film, he avoids his usual arrogant, sexed up gimmicks (which always work brilliantly) and develops a tender, cute, broken, soft, paranoid character who will get stuck to your memory for years to come.

Gabriel Medina's playful (but mature) direction is able to keep the fun going in this high-class, hipster dramedie about a loser writing a screenplay while struggling with his insecure being and working in children's parties as Cachito, the purple, fluffy monster.

The screenplay takes you deep into an underachiever's heart. A man who closes his curtains at night, smokes a joint and dances wildly to punkrock music in the safe environment of his apartment. A man who is afraid of living and avoids any kind of human relationship. A man who is, and probably will always be, alone.

One of the underrated elements of this movie (everybody focuses on Daniel Hendler's uncanny acting... not that there's anything wrong with that, of course) is the music score, which is so subtle, so tiny and precise that helps us understand the lead character instead of telling us how to feel or think. The soundtrack is also wonderful and absolutely downloadable.

Don't miss this one for anything in the world. Truly inspiring for any fan of slacker cinema, a truly wonderful work from the 25 Watts generation.

Go Hendler! Go Medina! Awesome!

A wet dream.

Whoever thinks this is Dangerous Minds in French is out of his fuckin mind.

And whoever thinks these students are scary and unrealistic... is lucky to have been in such a nice school.

A masterpiece.

Entertaining, funny, touching and moving, but also tense, raw, cruel and heartbreaking.

One of the funniest, wackiest, most interesting homages to the French Nouvelle Vague nowadays.

Absolutely, one of the most hilarious movies of 2008.

Even with a mind-blowing cinematography, smart editing and nerve-wracking patience from both directors, it doesn't stop being a documentary about a freakin pond and the birds living in it for a little bit more than an hour which felt like four or five hours.

One of the most boring movies I've ever seen.

Awful.