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Starring |
Benicio Del Toro
,
Franka Potente
,
Joaquim De Ameida
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Directed By |
Steven Soderbergh
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Audio
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Dolby Digital 5.1
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Visuals
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1.85:1 Anamorphic Widescreen
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Running Time |
127 mins
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UK Release Date |
June 29, 2009
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Genre |
Drama
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Our Rating |
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User Rating |
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They don’t make revolutionaries like they used to. Whereas today’s British lefties can usually barely be roused from reading The Guardian, the Latin American guerrillas of the 1960s would spend months in the jungle, growing beards and waging war on their imperialist enemies. None were as famous as Che Guevara (Del Toro). Having played a vital role in swinging Cuba towards Fidel Castro at the end of Che Part One (which is also out on DVD this month), Part Two picks up the story six years later in 1965. Now a leading dignitary in the Castro regime, Che suddenly drops out of public life, sneaking off to Bolivia in the hope of exporting the revolution there.
Without wishing to give anything away, this particular endeavour by the Commandant isn’t a huge success. Che does little better against the Bolivian Army than Butch and Sundance did. This is therefore inevitably a gloomier and less optimistic film than Part One. Whereas the first film saw the guerrillas in Cuba united by revolutionary fervour, in this one they’re all over the place, losing discipline, running out of supplies and basically getting nowhere.
This retains most of the qualities of the first film: Del Toro is great, for example, but also the flaws, namely that it’s hard to give much of a stuff about Che, when so little of his inner life is revealed. It’s also generally a little bit duller than the first film, something the three rather dry interviews on the disc do little to alleviate. It’s odd that for such an apparent labour of love, Soderbergh didn’t put a bit more effort into the extras – perhaps a Special Edition will appear in the future.
However, for having the guts to produce what amounts to a four hour biopic of Che Guevara and largely pulling it off, Soderbergh deserves credit. These are his best films since his Traffic/Erin Brockovich double whammy at the start of the decade.
Overall Verdict: Slower than Part One but, overall, a satisfying conclusion to an ambitious and largely successful enterprise.
Special Features:
Interview with Benicio Del Toro
Interview with Composer Alberto Inglesias
Interview with Author and Che Guevara Expert Jon Lee Anderson
Reviewer: Chris Hallam
Compare prices on Che Parts One and Two and Box Set