A better life
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | A better life |
| Original title | A better life |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English , Spanish |
| Publishing year | 2011 |
| length | 94 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Chris Weitz |
| script | Eric Eason |
| production | Chris Weitz Jami Gertz Paul Junge Witt Christian McLaughlin |
| music | Alexandre Desplat |
| camera | Javier Aguirresarobe |
| cut | Peter Lambert |
| occupation | |
| |
A Better Life ( "A Better Life") is a feature film of American director Chris Weitz from the year 2011 . He tells the story of a Mexican gardener who is staying illegally in the USA and who is striving for a better future for himself and his son. The leading actor Demián Bichir was nominated for an Oscar for his performance .
action
Carlos Galindo works as a gardener in Los Angeles. His son Luis is in high school and Carlos goes to great lengths to keep him out of the influence of local street gangs. This turns out to be difficult, however, since Luis's friend Ruthie Valdez is the niece of a well-known gang leader.
Carlos works hard to make his American dream come true for himself and his family . When one day he can buy a used pick-up with his money, the fulfillment of this dream seems to be in the foreseeable future. But soon afterwards the pick-up is stolen and Carlos has to venture into the gang milieu against his will in order to put his circumstances in order.
background
The director Chris Weitz, known for his films About a Boy and The Golden Compass , among other things, enlisted the help of the Jesuit pastor Gregory Boyle, founder of the well-known self-help project Homeboy Industries , the ex-criminal from the gang milieu helps to re-socialize. Among other things, Boyle brokered locations and helped Weitz to portray the events as authentically as possible. The film explicitly focuses on the culture and local habitus of Los Angeles , which is reflected in the English original, among other things, in the slang of street gangs.
In a way, the film represents a novelty in the film industry, as for the first time a US production was almost exclusively cast with Hispanic actors and moves entirely in the Hispanic milieu.
The film was released on June 24, 2011 in the USA.
reception
Most of the film received positive reviews from the critics. The US film critic Rogert Ebert gave the film 3.5 out of a possible 4 points and praised the actor's performance as “perfectly perfect”. On the Rotten Tomatoes website , A Better Life received a highly above-average rating of 85%. The film also achieved an average of 64 out of 100 points on Metacritic.com .
Demián Bichir was nominated for an Oscar for his portrayal of Carlos Galindo . There were also nominations for the Independent Spirit Award and the Screen Actors Guild Award . Composer Alexandre Desplat was also recognized for his work on the project.
Web links
- A Better Life in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- A Better Life at Rotten Tomatoes (English)
- Metacritic (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Information: General on IMDb.com (accessed on February 26, 2012).
- ↑ Homeboy Industries helps with "A Better Life" in the New York Times
- ↑ Homeboy Industries helps with "A Better Life" in the New York Times
- ^ Internet Movie Database
- ↑ Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun Times (accessed February 26, 2012).
- ↑ Collected Reviews (accessed February 26, 2012)
- ↑ Metacritic.com (accessed February 12, 2012)
- ↑ Awards & Nominations (accessed on February 26, 2012)