The smallest problem in the love story between the drug boss Pablo Escobar and television journalist Virginiya Vallejo is that he is married! "Loving Pablo" is a film based on Vallejo's novel and looks at their relationship primarily from her point of view. They meet when she and her colleagues are invited to a sophisticated party in Escobar's enormous home. She later learns that the occasion was the foundation of Medellin's drug cartel, not his philanthropic activity, as he tells her. From thence on, things are growing fast between them and you have the feeling that she is an observer of action. The speed at which he manages to divorce her with her previous husband, buy her jewelry and clothes and make her an ally not only in bed is really impressive. The film also tracks the development of Pablo Escobar as a trafficker and a criminal, as well as his ambition to be a politician. Their relationship lasted nearly five years, and from the beginning with gifts and private aircraft ending with death threats to her.
This epic and very erroneous love story also requires the right actors to take it out. He finds them in the faces of the talented couple Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem. For the husbands in life, this is far from being their first film together. Hardly anyone watching the Spanish film "Jamon, Jamon" at Bigas Luna, when they both attract the attention of the world to themselves, can forget their hot sex scene. However, as we know, the love of the actors is transferred much later into real life, not until Woody Allen collects them in "Vicky Cristina Barcelona". The rest is a well-known story - a stable marriage, two children and world careers with an Oscar for everyone. Cruz and Bardem are perfect like Vallejo and Escobar. Penelope tells a while ago in an interview that Javier was as persuasive as the drug dealer that he was not tired of finishing the photos and returning her husband, really embarrassed her in that role. And Bardem admits that too many times he has suggested Escobar, but he has now thought it is the right project. He wanted to show him as a real man, not a distorted cinematic villain, because he was terrifying and cruel and whatever he looks like in some productions, none of his actions are "cool." In this film, the actor looks much like Pablo - with a huge clunk all the time, and everything around him seems abominable and unclean, not just literally. The scene in which he runs pure naked naked in the jungle after having just sex with a minor girl and the police attacking his organization's camp is so embarrassing and at the same time you can not take a look at his grotesque figure. Bardem transmits so successfully the passion and passion of Pablo Escobar in every respect. The promises to his wife to stop seeing Vallejo are so sincere that you, as a spectator, believe him completely, knowing from real life that this will not happen.
Cruz recreates Vallejo , mastering the way a self-loving, beautiful woman, accustomed to the men at her feet, is talking and talking. For her, Pablo is as much a trophy as she is for him. She feels both protected and courteous, although it is clear that there is no way to talk about a monogamous connection. Escobar's lovers for countless. Vallejo goes through a long process of communicating with Pablo - an initial attraction, sexual thrill, love, followed by hatred and ultimately despair. And if in other screenings, Vallejo is portrayed as much more unpleasant and insignificant to Pablo, then in history written by herself, this can not be true. The scenes with the strongest moments between both are two - the one in which he gives her a gun to be safe, and when she refuses it, without stopping to chew what she eats, he tells her to the last nasty detail what all the men gathered from the jungle would do it if they attacked her for it. And of course, the final clash between them, in which her desperation has reached its climax, and he knows he holds her in his hands. Ultimately, however, it cooperates with the authorities against it. Peter Sarsgaard is a very successful addition to the cast as a representative of the drug department, Shepherd.
Director and one of the writers of this dramatic rather thriller than any other is the Spaniard Fernando Leon de Aranoa, winner of a bunch of prestigious film awards for his work on films with very strong social messages . Not for the first time he worked with Bardem, and among the starring names he left in his hands were Benicio Del Toro, Tim Robbins and Olga Kurilenko in his last film before "A Perfect Day".
The most ridiculous thing is that in moments when you see a monster that kills people with a chainsaw or blows up airplanes with innocent citizens, you at the same time believe him that he loves his children very much. You trust him that little Manuela is his princess and wants the little Juan Pablo to be proud of his father. His family is his greatest love and his Achilles heel, which was ultimately used against him. "Loving Pablo" will never bring you any new insights into Pablo Escobar's life, but if you're looking at explosive chemistry and Bardem and Cruz's first-rate acting, that's your movie.
