El árbol de la sangre

Magical realism in its most amazing, accessible, and pure form. Julio Medem is a great epic storyteller, a brilliant Basque director from San Sebastian, who captivated me just as he did twenty years ago with his perhaps most famous film Sex and Lucia. And yet this film requires the viewer's complete concentration, you can't relax even for a few seconds, it intertwines so many time dimensions and complex relationships between characters that you can't be thinking about anything else. The editing was top notch. In general, I have a feeling that no actors or actresses are allowed who don't meet the criteria of physical attractiveness, and with Julio Medem this may be taken to the extreme. Almost as if it were a reference to Boris Vian and "Et on tuera tous les affreux"! :-) (26.02.2024)

I can't help but feel like The Tree of Blood is a classic case of modern melodrama. The premise seems intriguing at first glance, but the execution falls short. The story twists just didn’t land for me, and there’s way too much emphasis on sex and arguments. It became a struggle to stay invested. On the technical side, it’s solid, though some of those supposedly "epic" scenes left me scratching my head. I guess that's just how they like it in Spain. (10.06.2020)