José & Pilar (2010)

hyped garbage

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

A true love story indeed and a real one. The Portuguese novelist José Saramago (1998 Nobel Prize winner) knew in the second half of his life, by chance, the Spanish journalist Pilar Del Rio, more than 20 years younger than him and they fell in love with each other almost at once. They lived together till his death in 2010. From a certain moment on they went to live in Lanzarote (Canary Islands) since he found much more support from the Spanish authorities than from the Portuguese ones at the time. They eventually married each other. This movie shows the last years of their lives in a documentary form with great quality. The images speak for themselves without the need of great explanations and the dialogues between the couple and with other people are so natural, spontaneous and true and supported by a very intelligent shooting and cut that we can feel how that relationship between novelist and wife is illuminated by a true love, a love that doesn't have great visual expression in manners and attitudes but whose depth we can feel in the constant cooperation and assistance Pilar gives to José not only personal but also and very important, in his writing activities, being simultaneously a careful and loving wife and an efficient secretary and public relations. Thus she contributed very much to his literary success and we can also feel his gratitude for that. This documentary real love story will touch you more than many fiction movies of the same kind.

This film, as Variety has mentioned, definitely blurs the line between documentary and fiction -If one does not recognize the protagonists - it could just as well be a fictional film about Love - as it should be.The film is captivating, avoids sentimentality and becomes expansive in your mind days after viewing. Will probably have to see it various times to really capture the organic magic that Goncalves has created in Jose and Pilar.As a side note, it is curious to note that Saramago not only wrote the Elephant's Journey during this film but 2 more stories, Cain and The Notebook after the film ...It is a hopeful piece of film. Just beautiful.

This is a story about love and about truth. The honesty starts behind the camera - Miguel Gonçalves Mendes captured that truth as if he wasn't there. And therefore, he was, inside and aside. That is exactly what gives us this enormous feeling of getting to know the intimate being of one of the greatest writers of all times: Saramago and his Pilar. There's something curious about the movie title "José and Pilar" - "pilar" (as "pillar") in Portuguese means "firm, upright, insulated support for a superstructure". Pilar was indeed the pillar for Saramago. And so was he to her the other way around, as in great love stories must be.

The Portuguese Nobel Laureate José Saramago was never an easy writer or agreeable public figure. Moreover, his political inclinations, a mixture of Iberism and Communism, were quite the opposite of mine. So I must admit that I sat down to watch the documentary with some degree of prejudice.However the opening and the quality of the photography captivated me immediately and I could not stop wandering how the Director managed to make such a remarkably enjoyable documentary with such persona.It certainly helped the fact that his young wife – Pilar – is such a lively and interesting person. She is the personification of the vibrant qualities we find among modern Spaniards. But what captivated me more was how she could devote herself so intensely to an elderly and sick husband.The Director, being himself an admirer of José, did not attempt to color or capture only the rosy moments of the Portuguese writer. He gives a truthful and yet endearing image of the couple.The secret probably lies in the way he manages to show that love knows no age barriers. Undoubtedly, this is an Oscar-winning candidate.