To Fear and To Love

Rating: 9/10 (14 August 2019)

A train departs a station in 1974 and two lovers, Irene and Benjamin, part before they come together. "Te mo" is to fear and "te amo" is to love. Love and fear at the same moment. This multi-layered, rich, brutal and beautiful film revolves around this dichotomy in many ways.
Decades after the train left the station, Benjamin is unhappily retired from a prosecutor's office. He does not like what he sees in the mirror. An unsolved case, a savage rape and murder, weighs heavily on his mind, as does Irene. Benjamin and Irene worked on the case together and as it unraveled, so did they. So with more purposes than one, Benjamin resumes investigating the murder. New discoveries and different perspectives instill hope in Benjamin for solving the mysteries and memories that haunt him. People may change but their passions don't.
The justice system is not clean or simple in any country, and this brilliant film reveals how complex and ugly it can be. The Secret in Their Eyes seamlessly combines multiple genres including crime thriller, romance and drama. There is appealing depth to the story, characters, themes, acting and photography. The characters, for example, are not one dimensional. They are vulnerable, make mistakes, regret choices and, in sum, are fully human. Themes revolve around memories, justice, love, vengeance and more. Soledad Villamil (Irene) and Ricardo Darín (Benjamin) perform amazingly well together. The chemistry is palpable. The film won the Academy Award for best foreign language film.