302 Best Movies to Watch In Spanish (Page 10)

It’s a bold move, centering a drama around a creature as docile as a donkey, but EO pulls it off without ever leaning on the crutch of CGI. Instead, the film makes ingenious use of a hundred-year-old film technique: the Kuleshov effect. By splicing the image of the titular donkey’s placid, expressionless face against visual stimulus, the illusion of a genuine reaction is produced.

But don’t be mistaken: this is no twee Disney-esque tale of anthropomorphism. Inspired by the classic Au Hasard Balthasar, EO tracks the haphazard journey of a former circus donkey across Europe — one that is often depicted in surreal psychedelic reds instead of idyllic picture-book tones, and punctured by more horrors than joys (though we do, thankfully, get to see him munch away on some well-deserved carrot treats). EO’s docility frames him as a kind of holy innocent, making the cruelty meted out to him feel all the more like a grave violation of something sacrosanct. Seeing the world through his oft-neglected perspective also makes this a movie about humans by proxy — a fresh, empathetic approach that, even in its obvious dramatic liberties, makes us meditate on both the depth of experience that may be unfolding in our animal neighbors and our role in shaping it.

Genre: Drama

Actor: Isabelle Huppert, Kateřina Holánová, Lolita Chammah, Lorenzo Zurzolo, Mateusz Kościukiewicz, Sandra Drzymalska, Tomasz Organek, Waldemar Barwiński

Director: Jerzy Skolimowski

Rating: NR

A mother and her two children move from Colombia to Queens, New York to join the father. Once there, he abandons them and moves to Miami.

With no family to fall back on, barely speaking English, an inexistent social welfare system and two little kids who require care; the mother quickly runs out of options. At first, she tries to sell empanadas in the street, then tries to become a temporary worker, but a mixture of obstacles keeps getting in the way.

Entre Nos is about the precariousness of the immigrant experience: about how quickly things can go wrong. But it’s also about how survival instincts and motherly love can stand in the face of complete desperation.

Genre: Drama

Actor: Andres Munar, Annie Henk, Anthony Chisholm, Clem Cheung, Eddie Martinez, Farah Bala, Felipe Bonilla, Jacqueline Duprey, Laura Montana, Paola Mendoza, Sarita Choudhury, Sebastian Villada

Director: Gloria La Morte, Paola Mendoza

Rating: Not Rated

This quiet French coming-of-age romance is about two boys who live in the Pyrénées mountains in the south of France. Getting to school is an ordeal for both of them but more so for Thomas, the son of shepherds, who has to travel for two hours each way. Damien, the other teenager, lives closer to the school in a big home with his mother who is the town's doctor. 

The two boys initially fight at school, taking turns at bullying each. Damien's mother intervenes, inviting Thomas to live with them so that he can be closer to school.

Co-written by Céline Sciamma (Portrait of a Lady on Fire) and the movie's legendary director André Téchiné.

Genre: Drama

Actor: Alexis Loret, Corentin Fila, Jean Corso, Jean Fornerod, Kacey Mottet Klein, Mama Prassinos, Sandrine Kiberlain

Director: André Téchiné

In 1984, Michael Jordan was a rising star and Nike had yet to make its mark in the basketball industry. With nothing to lose, Nike had to make a choice: settle behind the far more successful Adidas and Converse or shoot its shot and bet everything they have to win Jordan? 

You don’t have to be an NBA fanatic to know what Nike went with. The real-life story of how Air Jordans came to be is compelling in itself, but the dramatized version of it in Air is told with extra verve and charm, with director Ben Affleck and writer Alex Convery successfully turning a business pitch into something funny, moving, and highly watchable, predictable beats and all. 

Air covers the big hits and misses of business (which it buoys with lighthearted jokes and tender backstories), provides an addictive 80s soundtrack (without caricaturing the era), and gives us likable, rootable characters (an impressive feat given that this is, essentially, a Nike ad campaign). Matt Damon and Viola Davis, especially, turn in performances that elevate Air into something quite special. And while this film may be more about the Air than the Jordans, it is still a champion's story—familiar and cheesy at times, sure, but feel good, inspiring, and truly winning. 

Genre: Comedy, Drama, History

Actor: Al Madrigal, Albert Stroth, Andy Hirsch, Ari Davis, Asanté Deshon, Barack Obama, Barbara Sukowa, Ben Affleck, Billy Smith, Chris Messina, Chris Tucker, Damian Young, Dan Bucatinsky, Deloris Jordan, Dempsey Gibson, Gabrielle Bourne, Geoffrey Gould, Gustaf Skarsgård, Jackson Damon, Jason Bateman, Jay Mohr, Jerry Plummer, Jessica Green, Joel Gretsch, Joshua Funk, Julius Tennon, Mackenzie Rayne, Marlon Wayans, Matt Damon, Matthew Maher, Michael Jordan, Michael O'Neill, Richard Allan Jones, Tami Jordan, Tom Papa, Ure Egbuho, Viola Davis

Director: Ben Affleck

Rating: R

Before anything else, Utama will knock you off your feet with its breathtaking beauty. Set in the Bolivian highlands, it captures the arid landscape both in gorgeous wide shots and in unique detail. Then, after you take it all in and remember the vastness of the world and the smallness of humanity, the film ushers you into the lives of Virginio and Sisa, an elderly couple who get by with llama grazing. 

Theirs is a small but peaceful life, but it is endangered when a drought in the area makes it harder for everyone—especially a sickly Virginio—to live. Underlying conflicts start to emerge, such as old vs. new and country vs. city, when everyone but Virginio considers leaving the mountains. It's a simple story told at a purposefully slow pace, but it's one worth viewing for the tender performances, the urgent themes, and of course, the stunning cinematography.

Genre: Drama

Director: Alejandro Loayza Grisi

Consisting almost entirely of a single camera angle and long stretches of either silence or mundane conversation, The Plains makes for a particularly challenging—but incredibly unique—example of slow cinema. While its premise may seem almost too minimalist for its own good, the way the film is set up immediately draws us toward how distant people in the present day can be to each other despite our urbanized society. Stuck in this car with these two characters, one becomes hyperaware of how things are both moving too quickly and too slowly, and how so much of life is made up of the in-between moments. The film's fiction elements eventually break the docudrama illusion a little too bluntly (mainly through some suspiciously structured dialogue), but by then one should be too invested to want to get off.

Genre: Documentary, Drama

Actor: Andrew Rakowski, Cheri LeCornu, David Easteal, Inga Rakowski

Director: David Easteal

Anyone who’s seen Pietro Marcello’s Martin Eden will likely recognize the director’s fingerprints all over Scarlet. There’s the same haunting collage of colorized archival documentary footage and fictional scenes here, the same fascination with physical labor and historical moments of transition, the same loose approach to literary adaptation. Scarlet’s story is drawn from a 1923 Russian adventure novel but the action is transposed to post-WW1 rural France, where soldier Raphaël (Raphaël Thiéry) returns from the war to discover his wife has died and left him with a daughter, Juliette (Juliette Jouan). The local townsfolk reject the duo, but they manage to keep their head above water thanks to a kindly landlady with a storybook belief in magic and Raphael’s Geppetto-like skills at whittling beautiful toys from blank blocks of wood.

The fairy tale touches don’t stop there: the color grading and bucolic setting give the movie the look and texture of a fable, while Juliette is enraptured by a prophecy — given to her by a witchy forest woman — that tells her she’ll one day be swept away by scarlet sails in the sky. It’s a charming, if airy, yarn, but the craftsmanship in front of and behind the camera makes Scarlet a gorgeous escape.

Genre: Drama, History, Romance

Actor: Anne-Lise Heimburger, Annette Trumel, Antonin Stahly-Vishwanadan, Arthur Orcier, Bernard Blancan, Boris Gillot, Ernst Umhauer, François Négret, Iliana Zabeth, Lolita Chammah, Louis Garrel, Natascha Wiese, Noémie Lvovsky, Pierre Nisse, Raphaël Thiéry, Rémy Roubakha, Vincent Pietton, Yolande Moreau

Director: Pietro Marcello