Good, but could have been *so* good.

Rating: 6/10 (9 September 2013)

This is a difficult film to rate.
Stylistically, it is stunningly imaginative and bold. The renditions of magical realism are some of the best, the aesthetic beauty of which simply cannot be put into words. It is worth a look on this alone.
On the other hand, the film also suffers from problems. It comes down to doing too much in too little space and losing metaphorical coherence. By the middle of the second act, it is no longer clear which parts of the film are to be understood literally but farcically, and which purely metaphorically, and that detracts from the central redemptive message.
The story itself is simple, in a way that all universal and human stories are at their core, so it truly has great potential. However, in the film it is rushed into the third and final act without producing a full punch despite a great deal of action. The long middle act is again the downfall. It inexplicably explores the external manifestation of conflict in near exclusion to the internal conflict. Or perhaps it puts too much burden on the viewer to infer deeper (and anyways strained) allegories. As a result, what could have been a transformative film is saddled with an emotional and philosophical content only shallowly elicited. This is unfortunate and even unfair, but it is the only way to explain this unsated feeling.