Soderbergh Marathon: Part 21

Intro

Che (2008)

You ever watched a movie that you appreciated, that was well-made, that you maybe even sort of liked, but you knew instantly when it was over: I'm never going to watch this movie again.  Of course you have.  That's Che, which is technically two separate movies, but can also work as one very long movie.

Che is about the legendary and controversial Ernesto Che Guevara (obviously) and it's not so much a biography as a chronicle of two parts of his life.  In the first part, there are three distinct timelines, from Fidel Castro convincing him to help with the Cuban Revolution in 1954, the actual Cuban Revolution, and then the last part is him getting interviewed by Lisa Howard in America and his impassioned speech against American imperialism in 1964.

The second part is laser-focused on the year-long and failed attempt at duplicating the success of the Cuban revolution in Bolivia.  There is no distinct timelines in part two, just a chronological storyline following Che and the slowly demoralizing slog he and his troops experienced.

Oddly enough, both movies are pretty much exactly the same length, and if you describe the two movies to me beforehand, I'd be sure that part one is better.  But it isn't.  And yet if you just watched part two, I think you might not really appreciate that movie either.  Soderbergh was really interested in the failed Bolivian revolution, but felt that viewers would have no context for that.  He was right.

He's clearly less interested in the Cuban revolution than the latter.  The two parts were based on diaries written by Che himself, and apparently the Cuban revolution diary was written in hindsight, so everything is written with the knowledge that they were successful.  The latter diary was written as it happened, so you got all the gritty details.  So you can kind of understand why the latter is more appealing, because it's more accurate to the day-to-day.

That's really the appeal of this movie.  It's a strange kind of "slice of life" movie where you just follow Che and soldiers engage in guerrilla warfare.  The latter experience is not a pleasant one, hence me not wanting to watch it again.  It's just things just gradually getting worse for the soldiers.  They get no help from villagers, which they did in Cuba.  Some of the soldiers themselves seem less committed.  According to this movie, this was doomed to fail even if the CIA didn't intervene.

So you have part one, which provides context for the second part of the movie, but it's simply not as engaging of a movie.  It's less clear what he's trying to accomplish with their battles and daily grind until you see the second part, and you have the contrast of the two together.

It's here usually where I will make a note about the actors, but to be honest it's basically Benicio del Toro's show.  The other actors don't necessarily make an impression, even though I recognize more than a few.  This movie isn't for them.  Oscar Isaac is the translator in America, but I'm not even sure he's on screen for that long.  And he isn't in the second movie.

Is this worth four and a half hours of your time?  This might fall under the "I wouldn't really recommend it, but I don't think you'd regret it if you know what you're getting into."  I think both movies could have benefited from being shorter, even though the long slog of the latter movie is the point.  There's some repetitiveness to the soldiers just doing daily stuff in both movies.

So I guess it depends on your interest in Che the person?  Which honestly it's not like a real deep reflective look at the guy.  But it is interesting to follow his two primary revolutions and why one seemed to succeed when the other didn't.

Che: Part One - 2.5 stars
Che: Part Two - 3 stars