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A Major Disappointment

Entertaining from beginning to end, it maintains the spirit of the franchise while establishing it's own seal with a fun cast

I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

In 1952, 23 year old medical student Ernesto Guevara de la Serna (Gael García Bernal) later known as Che Guevara decides to spend 4 months to ride around South America with 29 year old biochemist friend Alberto Granado (Rodrigo De la Serna) on an old beat-up motorcycle. There are girls, fights, breakdowns, sickness and most importantly Che's discovered connections to the people.Gael García Bernal is a real charmer and a convincing ladies man. He is handled with reverence. The country is beautiful. The story meanders like their trip. The relationship is not that compelling and they have no deep revelations. They are mostly a bickering couple. It's a little funny but repetitive. It's like a travelogue without much tension. If not for Che, this would be a rather unremarkable road movie.

This film was a very well constructed chapter for one of the most famous leaders from contemporary America.I begun the movie based on recommendations from peers and did not have an inkling of what the theme of the film was. I also never noticed this fact from the name of the protagonist Ernesto Guevara. This little fact helped me understand the story from an unbiased viewpoint and I could actually imagine the feelings and emotions of the young 20 something youth traveling & seeing the world for what it is. At many points within the movie I felt the strength in personality of Ernesto who had undertaken a life changing journey with the cheerful and happy-go-lucky Alberto Granado. Halfway through the movie I did begin to understand the socialist undertones of the movie and very late I realized that it was a biography outlining the birth of the purpose of one very popular "Che" (facepalm). And suddenly I could relate the underlying message which had been playing throughout the movie.I was glad that I viewed the story as a art project, a story of an anonymous youth who got to see the live documentary of silently suffering America and his own struggle through the darker side of the world which led to his ideological awakening. Ernesto was what many of are not as an individual, smart, good-looking, intelligent, well read, pensive, strong, adventurous and the list would go on. Most of all he was brutally honest but empathetic and could see the underlying truth of the situation. This is probably the most important quality that endeared him to the suffering masses and promoted his rise as a socialist leader.Apart from the future political controversies for Che, this was a very heartwarming account of his journey into adulthood and the kindling of his future ideological foray.

This is a film that wants to paint the picture of Che Gueverra's epiphany. It wants to be important. Brazilian Director Walter Salles (Central Staion) knows the basic approach of telling a chronological story, filled with visuals which tell the audience as much as the dialog. The idea of two friends embarking on a journey that could never be completed on its original terms (travelling South America on an old motorcycle with hardly any funds or plans to earn their way) makes for the small bit of drama we get. And that's the problem. The future history is irrelevant to the movie experience unless you are told otherwise, and we are not. Our lot is an expressed realization of inequity and injustice through roadside interviews, nothing first hand. That's not drama. Our boys struggling to get along despite their circumstances and ideals (one wants justice while the other comically wants women) seems to be what we are left with. Our two leads, Gael Garcia Bernal and Rodrigo de la Serna are compelling and keep our attention as the ultimate road trip duo. The music enchants the scenes bringing you into these travelers shoes, but their minds would never accept events this way. They came from family money and protected upbringings. It is an endearing movie at times but the change that is supposed to be taking place on screen is still somewhere in the writers' screenplay, you would have to believe. And here that's what you have to do.

Very well made movie. A journey which you will feel that you are a part of. I felt like I traveled across South America through this movie, the scenery of Latin America that I saw though this movie is beautiful. Gael García Bernal (Ernesto Fuser Guevara) was at his best and so Rodrigo de la Serna (Alberto Granado). They never came out of their role in any part of the movie. The movie shows the real situations that people of Latin America faced during that period. The movie is not a serious one also had some funny moments that really makes this movie more enjoyable. People who loves adventure and trip kind of movie, this one is a must watch.