Drama

Edward James Olmos portrays the real-life Jaime Escalante, a no-nonsense mathematic teacher in a tough East LA high school. Handed a classroom full of "losers" and "unteachables," Escalante is determined to turn his young charges' lives around. Drawing from his own cultural heritage, Escalante forms a bond with his largely Hispanic student body, evoking the names of famous Spaniards and Latin Americans whose great accomplishments were predicated on their ability to learn. The students gradually come to realize that the only way they'll escape their own poverty-stricken barrio is to improve themselves intellectually. As a result, the class' academic achievements soar dramatically -- too dramatically for the Educational Testing Service, which is convinced that the class' high test scores are the results of cheating. The triumphant exoneration of Escalante's students provides Stand and Deliver with its rousingly upbeat conclusion. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Evita is based on the musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. Actually, the film is more of an opera, with only short moments devoted to dialogue. "Evita" is the friendly, family version of the proper name "Eva," and this film tells the story of Eva Peron (1921-52), a woman whose name evokes powerful feelings in her native Argentina. Throughout this film, as in the musical, the story is explained and commented on by a character known as "Che," played here by Antonio Banderas. The film begins with the news of Evita's death, and then turns to a much earlier scene at her father's funeral. Eva (Madonna) was an illegitimate child (one of many) of a rural landowner and her seamstress mother. Hers is not a wealthy childhood by any means, and she is constantly discriminated against because of her lowly birth. She is refused admission to her father's funeral for this reason. This scene is contrasted with her own funeral, a spectacular affair, not different from the funeral of a beloved head of state. Eva Peron leaves her village at age 15, in the arms her lover Agustin Magaldi (Jimmy Nail), a traveling singer. With his help, she goes to Buenos Aires and begins her campaign to become a performer, actress, and public figure. Many men help her during these years, and she is reported to have given her favors freely. That changes when she becomes involved with Juan Peron (Jonathan Pryce). In 1944, when they meet, Peron is an ambitious young army officer, serving in the right-wing government of the time. When he falls afoul of the government and is imprisoned, Eva uses her position as a celebrity and radio performer to get him released. Peron marries his feisty mistress when he is freed from prison. Eva is a formidable supporter, and her help is crucial to his later becoming head of state. Once Juan Peron becomes the President of Argentina, Eva expects better treatment from Argentina's high society, but they snub her brutally. She, in response, diverts government money from society-led charities, and starts the Eva Peron Foundation. As its president, she works tirelessly to directly better the lot of Argentina's poor. For this work, and for having risen from poor origins to glory, she is beloved by huge masses of her fellow citizens, if not by those in high society. She also arranges for the enfranchisement of women in Argentina. Thus, her death of uterine cancer at age 33, while she was at the height of her power and influence, strikes the whole world as tragic. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Argentina's own Eva Peron gets an Argentine film biography in this production. For a woman who conducted her life with the bold strokes of grand opera, this effort to depict her human dimension rather than her mythical qualities might not have won her personal approval, but it offers a useful counterpoint to the musical play Evita by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, which was filmed at about the same time as this movie. Eva Peron was the beautiful illegitimate daughter of a rural landlord and a seamstress. She ran away to Buenos Aires when she was 15 with the help of her lover, a traveling singer. Once in the Argentine capital, she did everything in her power to become a prominent performer. A woman of tremendous intelligence, courage, cunning and guile, she reportedly lacked certain essential assets necessary for stage stardom such as native acting talent. However, her good looks and indomitable will took her a long way toward her goal. Then, in 1944, she met Juan Peron, an army officer on the rise in the Argentine government. Together, they formed a winning team, and with her help, Juan Peron became the President of Argentina. It is during Peron's first presidency that Eva strode from the pages of history into the realms of mythology. With an impeccable sense of drama, she combined her untiring and passionate advocacy for the poor with an unbridled contempt for the pretensions of the moneyed classes. Among her lasting and noteworthy accomplishments was winning the right to vote for Argentine women. Then, at the height of her power and influence, she died of uterine cancer. But despite the ravages of the illness, Peron maintained her public image and died with grace and dignity. While there is enough drama in her story to serve as the basis for countless movies, this one is of particular interest because it is by her countrymen. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Brazilian director Walter Salles Jr. follows up the Golden Globe-nominated Behind the Sun with this filmed adaptation of Argentinian-born Cuban revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara's journals of the same name. The Motorcycle Diaries stars Gael García Bernal (Y Tu Mamá También, Amores Perros) as a young, pre-revolution Guevara, a 23-year-old medical student in 1952 traveling across South America on a motorcycle with his friend Alberto Granado (Rodrigo de la Serna), who co-wrote the source material. As they embark on their journey, both young men come of age and find their individual world views broadened farther than they ever expected. The Motorcycle Diaries premiered at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival. ~ Matthew Tobey, All Movie Guide

A 15-year-old teen looking to escape civil strife in El Salvador finds her troubles have only begun upon arriving in Los Angeles in director Nate Thomas' grim drama. Alicia Montalvo (Jade Herrera) has just arrived in the U.S. in search of a better life, but soon after arriving at the home of her crack-addicted aunt and her younger brother, the sweatshop where she has found work is raided by the INS. When child welfare services notice the bruises Alicia received from her aunt after returning home from work with no money, they place her in foster care where she is separated from her sibling and falls prey to a sexual predator. Now pregnant and placed into a home for expectant teens, Alicia's spirit is still not broken and her determination is stronger than ever. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

A seemingly idyllic childhood is shattered in a nation torn apart by civil war in this powerful drama from Peru. Juan was an 11-year-old boy living in a small rural community when the town's corrupt mayor was killed. Local authorities believe that the murderers are part of the "Sendero Lumino" (meaning "Shining Path"), an underground revolutionary army dedicated to bringing down the government, and Juan's father, Fermin (Aristoteles Picho), is arrested for suspected involvement with the group. As Juan tries to adjust to life without his father, he's abducted by Wilmer (Sergio Galliani), a Sendero Lumino organizer who is grooming children of the movement into a guerilla army, though Juan has no inherent desire to fight. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Argentine director Juan Carlos Desanzo offers a grim variation on the classic tale of Oliver Twist with this gritty tale of a young orphan who falls in with a decidedly undesirable crowd. A resourceful street kid who earns his keep as a subway busker after fleeing from his abusive parents, the young runaway is soon bestowed with the moniker of "El Polaquito" due to his faithful renditions of the popular Polish tango singer's enduring ballads. Despite his rebellious nature and distaste for authority figures, El Polaquito soon finds employment with the shady Rengo - a thuggish criminal who employs a variety of child prostitutes, beggars, and thieves. Though he would like nothing more than to break free from Rengo's suffocating grip, El Polaquito finds his options frustratingly limited due to the fact that both his sister and the object of his affections are also employed by Rengo. Now, as he makes a valiant effort to break away and take along the two people he cares about most, El Polaquito is about to discover if he truly has what it takes to survive in an uncaring society in which the death of a common street child is a casual, everyday occurrence. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Rather than dramatize Castro's Cuban revolution as a central theme, this film made by Cubans in exile focuses on the disintegration of a young peasant's morality once he joins the revolutionary forces. The naive peasant was expecting adventure but before his stint in the military has ended, he is a trained killer, whether he is fully aware of it or not. When he takes up with a dance-hall woman in Havana and turns to drugs and alcohol, his decline accelerates, putting both his lover and his friends at the mercy of his slipping hold on stability. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

A man studying to be a writer learns some unpleasant lessons about himself in this drama. Alfonso (Giovanni Ciccia) is an aspiring novelist who, as part of his scholarship to a writing program, must take an internship at a tabloid newspaper alongside his girlfriend Nadia (Lucia Jimenez). While Nadia is given a simple office assignment, Alfonso is made an assistant to one of the paper's top writers, Faundez (Gianfranco Brero), which turns out to be a demanding job. With his driver Van Gogh (Carlos Gassols) and his photographer Escalona (Fele Martinez), Faundez heads out each day to collect stories through intimidation and emotional manipulation, and he has no qualms about using sources for his own purposes or passing along stories to his less-industrious significant other, Roxanna (Ynonne Frayssinet). While Alfonso is appalled by Faundez's shaky ethics and cavalier attitude toward women, it also begins to sink in, and when circumstances force Alfonso to take over for Faundez for a while, he's surprised to discover how much he's come to resemble the man he despises. Tinta Roja was based on the novel by Alberto Fuguet. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Unemployment among the young in Buenos Aires is the focus of this docudrama, the first feature from director Sandra Gugliotta. A Lucky Day focuses on Elsa, a young woman who dreams of fleeing her impoverished corner of Argentina for Italy, where an erstwhile boyfriend may or may not be waiting for her. Much as her friends try to persuade her to stay, Elsa feels the crushing legacy of her ancestors on her shoulders. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide

The destinies of the downtrodden citizens of a Brazilian shantytown converge in director Claudio Assis' stark tale of life on the fringe of society. Though Recife is a major Brazilian city with over 1.5 million inhabitants, the lives of the well-to-do exist as little more than an unreachable horizon to those who face the bleak day-to-day reality of existence on the street. Though butcher Wellington (Chico Diaz) admires his wife Kika's (Dira Paes) devotion to her religion, his motivation for supporting her spirituality lies more in the fact that he knows she will remain faithful (which he has not) than in any true concern for her soul. Delivering meat to a Texas hotel which serves as refuge to a collection of lost souls not unlike the butcher himself, the characters come together as Wellington offers his neighbors a series of portraits. As life stretches into a never-ending cycle of wasted days and lonely nights, the citizens of Recife do their best to search for meaning in the face of crushing poverty. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

A docudrama about the economic and social disparity between Brazil's upper and lower classes, Chronically Unfeasible was filmed over a five-year period as a fictionalized documentary. Director Sergio Bianchi trains his camera on ineffective union organizers, street children who fight over their toys, police engaging in random acts of brutality, and a black maid who is humiliated by the bourgeois family whom she has known almost all her life. Central to the film are scenes that take place at a restaurant, where a snotty middle-class couple picks at their food, a manager tries to make something of her life, and a young waiter is fired for sleeping with his boss. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, All Movie Guide