Fantasy, magical fiction ala Gabriel García Márquez light-hearted

Rating: 7/10 (27 June 2007)

Audience I watched with found some scenes funny enough to elicit loud laughs but I was led to believe this was a very funny movie, came away thinking it is a involved story that demands that the viewer accept some very unbelievable situations. Some really great staging and filming of some of these situations such as the last scene where a huge chunk of the sandy bank of the Danube breaks away and floats down-stream. The actors are competent maybe even very good. However the story covers fifty years. Makes for a very difficult stretch to accept that an actor can still be so strong, so good looking, so energetic after 50 years have elapsed. Really good score, music very good. One hundred-seventy minutes is a bit long to keep one's full attention though.