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21 out of 22 people found the following comment useful :- Loneliness and making connections, 21 January 2002 Author: Sanne Lehmann (sannelehmann@hotmail.com) from Denmark
Things you can tell just by looking at herIn Things you can tell just by looking at her we meet several women who for different reasons seem to be playing bit parts in their own lives. One of them takes care of her mother in a big lonely house, Rebecca stops listening to her own feelings because a baby does not fit into the life of her married lover, Rose discovers that her son is growing up, Calista's girlfriend is dying and ? takes care of her blind sister.After watching the film I thought: what does this film want to tell us about women? Or perhaps people in general. Some of the lines in the film stuck in my mind: The blind girl says about the woman who committed suicide: `I bet you could tell just by looking at her that there was a man involved.' When giving this line some thought I starting seeing the film as a comment on `loneliness' in general. What do people really want? They want to be involved with people. They want other people to see them.The film suggests that when people don't depend on anyone anymore when they have no one `to be' for - they chose to actually become nothing to die. The loneliness at the heart of existence is too hard to bear. I think the film is about the nature of making connections and being involved with other people although it is painful and sometimes lead to self-sacrifice. It shows us the horror which is tied with the fear of being left alone, although the connections which are made does little to remove the feeling of loneliness. It is the horror of a stranger walking into your personal sphere and immediately being able to see through you and see what lies beneath the surface. It is the horror of revealing your interest in other people - looking in on other peoples lives, in a desperate attempt to connect and to become involved. It is the horror of becoming involved with someone who cannot stay, the horror of losing those whom you connect with. When you are involved, and when you connect with someone, you face the danger of being hurt, being dumped - of sacrificing your own life in your care for others. It is the horror also that your sacrifice is not appreciated, the horror that when you are no longer a lover or a mother then you will certainly become nothing that your identity is so intricately tied with the dependence of those who need you that you cannot be `you' if they don't need you anymore. It is ultimately the horror of being defined by relations of interdependence where the people you care for in effect give you identity. It is the horror that you really are nothing without other people to mirror yourself in.Why is this form of `self-sacrifice' then particular to women? We learn from Walter's daughter that when he really gets involved `He dumps them like a hot potato'. Are women victims and easy to exploit? Rose's teenage son confides that people `are always' looking for someone. But is the act of making these connections and becoming involved truly more important to women - truly more essential in their attempt at becoming someone - of gaining an identity. Are women always characterized by either being cared for or being the ones who take care of others? Interestingly, none of these women are wives - they are defined by other types of relationships than those that arise between man and wife.I do not think I can answer these questions and I don't think the film wants to answer them either. But I think the film is a point of departure for discussing the nature of being - and the way we all perhaps depend upon others in order to become.7/10
17 out of 19 people found the following comment useful :- beautifully told stories of everyday, 29 July 2004 Author: Paul from Cambridge, MA, USA
The only other movie I've ever been moved to write a comment for was Mission to Mars. Unlike MtM, which I was moved to review due to it being one of the very worst movies I've ever seen, this one is truly touching. Things You Can Tell... is a testimony that an American movie, with well-known American actors, can be delicate, beautifully acted, and most of all, not chewed and explained to death. It does not regard its viewers as braindead; neither does it regard them as artsy. It is a movie for everyone, about people just like us.This is not an art-house movie - the story plot is a collection of stories about the everyday lives of everyday women (the reviewer who said she never seen such repulsive characters might be in for a shock if she actually talks to her daughter / mother / sister).It shows women beautifully, and absolutely believably. It also shows nicely that diversity is not a question of the skin color, but of the attitude (hence the stories feature only white women).It's also not a chick flick - while certainly it will be loved by women, it also works for cynical, hard to move guys like me.Watch it, it's really good, in a not-in-your-face, subtle way.
17 out of 22 people found the following comment useful :- I disagree..., 11 November 2004 Author: DannX68 from Copenhagen, Denmark
...with the other user. On the contrary, I find Things You Can Tell... to be a very intense drama. Even I, being male, could easily identify with all the characters. The title says it all, you know what these characters feel and think just by looking at them, and it's done in a very subtle and under-acted way. I must agree, though, that I, too, was surprised by Cameron Díaz; I knew all the other actresses to be first rate, but up until this movie, I'd always thought of Díaz as a dumb blonde; I'm glad she proved me wrong. I know a lot of Americans (and I'm NOT saying ALL) want big emotions, larger-than-life drama, and a lot of FX...but life isn't that way, life is like this movie: funny, touching, sad, lonely, full of love and, yes, even repressed. 10/10
9 out of 11 people found the following comment useful :- That's what it's all about, 3 February 2001 Author: celso1 (celso1@fibertel.com.ar) from Buenos Aires, Argentina
The greatest virtue of this movie resides in the close look the camera focuses on stories and characters. Slowly but relentlessly, humorous and cruel at the same time, it allows the time needed for seven wonderful actresses to reveal their most intimate and contradictory feelings, without relying exclusively on the dialogue. Thus, the stories really turn to be things you can tell about these women by just looking (attentively) at them.And isn't watching carefully what a movie is about?The result of this very "objective" look is the healthy absence of a moral, a trap writers tend to fall into when dealing with lesbian love, mortal diseases, abortion, loneliness, egotism, discrimination, etc.It's been labeled by some as a "feminist" film, another often mistaken category into which films with women protagonists fall into. I believe it's far from being such. It should appeal to both sensitive and sensible men and women.
7 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :- Touching and funny- the perfect fit to talk about women and how time is mean to them, 28 August 2001 Author: danielldb from Belo Horizonte, Brazil
Some questions remain without a plausible answer: why did THINGS YOU CAN TELL JUST BY LOOKING AT HER go direct to cable TV in the US? I don't know and I'm still angry about that, since it has a great cast and was very well received in Cannes. Fortunately, it was received a limited release here in Brazil, where it was a kind of art-house hit during the time of the year when only blockbusters have their place in the sun. The secret of its success here is not hard to understand: audiences who were tired of Hollywood crap found a small, quiet dramatic comedy with a good story, some heart-breaking moments (and some very funny ones, too) and terrific performances. This is the kind of film that touches everyone, even the coldest and most serious person, making them laugh and feel deep emotions. Despite its division in five stories, all of them excellent (except the part with the lesbian, which was too small), this film is carefully paced, helping us to understand each character's emotions. And each story has an interesting link to the other.If I had to choose my favorite part, I would have to think. The Dr. Keener story is sad and quiet, the one with Rebecca is the most thought-provoking, while the dwarf story is touching and funny, and the sister-sister story brilliantly closes the film.If you haven't seen this yet, watch it now. There are not many good films with "women" as the main subject, but this one is one of the best I've seen. It has an eye for detail, it makes us think with its reflection about what women are nowadays (I loved Cameron Diaz guessing about what made her sister's friend committing suicide). And there are great actresses which seem to fit the role perfectly: Glenn Close, Cameron Diaz, Amy Brennemann, Kathy Baker, Holly Hunter, Calista Flockhart and Valeria Golino. I hope Rodrigo Garcia, son of famed writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez, makes other great films like this.
5 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :- crazy title - beautiful film, 15 December 2006 Author: postmanwhoalwaysringstwice from usa
Writer/director Rodrigo Garcia's feature film debut "Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her" might have a jarring, if too long, title, but the son of Gabriel Garcia Marquez presents a passionate work of cinematic fiction. The film presents several short stories; snapshots of women at a crossroads. One story is of a doctor who has lost sight of spiritual meaning in her life, and has elicited the assistance of a tarot card reader to help her find her way. This card reader may assist people with getting through the future with clarity, but she has one foot in the past as she watches her girlfriend succumb to a debilitating disease.Each story intersects and overlaps the others in unique and interesting ways. The all-star cast of female talent bring to their deliberately under drawn characters some of their strongest performances, especially Calista Flockhart (at the time, fresh from "Ally McBeal") who provides her psychic character with fairy-like innocence, Kathy Baker who brings good-natured humorous curiosity to a role that could have quickly become a sociopath stalker, and Holly Hunter in an understated performance as a bank owner who contemplates the ramifications of motherhood on her life.
4 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :- Are you going to sing Feelings for me?, 12 February 2002 Author: Vivien-4 from Rotterdam, the Netherlands
This film consists of several different stories that are very loosely connected to each other. I was drawn into each individual story but would have liked to have known more about them. What would have made this film really good in my opinion is if there had been a single strong story line woven through all the stories; an interconnection that would have kept the coincidence intact, but would have made it an unseparable whole. That is what I missed. I am very happy though that at the end there was a kind of closing to each of the stories, but that really deserved more time. So a good film, with interesting characters and good portrayals, but it lacked the depth and interconnection that it made me both expect and hope to find.
8 out of 13 people found the following comment useful :- Delicate Passion, 6 August 2001 Author: tedg (tedg@FilmsFolded.com) from Virginia Beach
*** This comment may contain spoilers ***
Spoilers herein.The holy grail of acting is the multidimensional performance, but this is almost impossible to pull off. Many conditions must coalesce, and only a few actors can rise to the challenge: Penn is the current master with PS Hoffman coming up.This film takes another, more elegant and though novel, more satisfying approach. Many good actresses are involved. The dimensions are separated into five threads which we are helped to rebraid through the careful efforts of those actresses.What we have is one prototypical character portrayed five different ways, by actresses that have radically different acting styles. Each focuses entirely on her own weaving, but it is clear that they are aware of the others. Hunter's mouth during the baglady's harangue deliberately quotes Close's during the tarot session. Hunter's stagger after the abortion has a couple steps in there from Close's demented mother. Flockhart's dying lover has some literally copied breaths taken from Hunter's abortion...No medium is quite like film. All art is a conversation between the artist and the recipient. But only in film is there an explicit party interjected -- the actor -- who can represent either the viewer, or the artist, or neither, or both (or themselves). In addition to the multidimensionality of the actors' roles, the writing here places the actors in shifting stances, shifting through all the choices listed. There is no self-reference; that would distract. everything is focused on me and Garcia, and the connection is manifold.And what focus! How close to the bones of womanhood can one get? How deeply into the mysteries of connection can one go? Connections between lovers of course, but the feminine nature of the connection that film can afford us between writer and our inner selves. Not since Polanski have I seen such sculptural direction with women. I wish we could see just what was the dialog between director and actress to coax such bare, clean performances.The writing too. Screen writing is the hardest thing to do when you want to be true. You've got to be fake in just the right way to appear true. Flat truth always is fake. Only the most deft artifice can be true. Only the truly delicate writer can be deft with a woman's heart, which after all is the nexus of truth. Only the writer who knows all the tricks of the film stage can remove the wires and let that honesty fly.We have here a new talent. You really must see this film.(Whatever Ms Flockhart is doing on TeeVee is certainly a waste.)
2 out of 2 people found the following comment useful :- Honest & honourable, 15 May 2007 Author: vitachiel from Netherlands
This film is very slow but never boring and that's a remarkable feat. The acting is superb and the stories are emotional but never too sentimental. Just some more or less tragic women's stories in modern-day life. Of course, there are many politically correct moves, like the lesbian couple, the black husband, the blind girl, the dwarf and the beggarwoman, but this is not really annoying. The only thing that I found a bit out of reality were the overly smart kids (i.e. Rose's son and the blind daughter). All in all, good work on women's issues by male director.
3 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :- Modern and different, 8 January 2007 Author: warmtrooper from Berkeley, CA
An intelligent and open-ended examination into the emotions of about 6 different women, vignetted and ultimately interwoven. There's no high drama, but quiet, studied and subtle plays and conversation, and a superb soundtrack to heighten the tension of each vignette.This is a cold, clinical examination of the female heart. I'm a man who likes Steven Seagal films, and the film touched me. It does not attempt much, but what it does attempt it succeeds very well. A bank manager, a divorced mother, an OBGYN, a blind woman, her detective sister, a tarot card reader and her dying female lover...are all examined in a cold modern light, and it is left to the viewer to judge if these women are happy or not. Some vignettes are more compelling than others, such as the bank manager (Holly Hunter), and the divorced mom.8 points.
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