Valentin | Review

60’s memoir pours on the sugar but fails to say something about anything.

Formatted into a series of anecdotal life-affirming episodes in a sort of year-in-the-life of an eight year-old, Argentinean director Alejandro Agresti’s coming-of-age tale centers on the director’s own personal collection of childhood memories. Picked up by Miramax in a long list of sentimental feel-good foreign films, Valentin is a lighthearted affair that gets a large dose of charm from its diminutive star with thick glasses and a big-sized brain, unfortunately, the film is cute in a terminal cancer type of way.

Raised by his grandmother in a small two-floored basement apartment in piece of Buenos Aires, this charming little boy played by Rodrigo Noya is the voice of the story, perhaps he doesn’t have 20/20 vision, but he sees and understands life way beyond his years. An inspiring astronaut, Valentin’s highly imaginative perspective on matters serves as a protection from the lack of attention that he so needy desires. Agresti stitches together many quirky anecdotes and as a whole we come to understand how the small, not so insignificant moments do have impact 40-years down the road. The film strives to define the importance of forged relationships-as with the boys relation to an older gent, a neighbor next door and the tall, young and beautiful woman courting his father named Leticia (Julieta Cardinale).

Like the child in the commercial who slowly eats his French fries, the boy who plays Valentin is milked onscreen for all of his cuteness, but the sugar-coated charm seems to affect the overall agenda of the film. Rather than raising any serious issues about adult responsibility and country’s political instability, Agresti simplifies his film by not making a case about such points. The film never delves deep into the complexity of this little boy’s life of abandonment, preferring a more neutral approach one that dramatizes and almost demonizes the parental figures without making a clear statement.

Valentin’s cute child narration and reflections told from the point of view of a child but in a mentality and voice of an adult will easily delight most foreign audiences. While Agresti prescribes a Cinema Paradiso formula, perhaps a better idea would have been to follow the complexities of Czech film like Koyla which addressed the pain and connection between parental figures and young children.

Rating 2 stars