Sadly Over-hyped

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

First of all my mind made up too many scenarios, like family members are full of barberians who were trying to some kind of hypnotical experiments or Alicia has a serious mentall illness but later than it all became make sense (which is too long for explain) and finally get involved with it. I've just loved the ending, mix with herbal tea, 15 valium and also unknown 3 pills of course she would have a fatal heart attack! Ending was all about traditional treatments againts modern treatments. In general this movie is just not for everyone so it doesn't make it boring. Great movie with disturbing scenes.

This is the kind of film that IMDb does a disservice. The reviewers appear to fall into two camps. One that are expecting something else and are not mentally prepared for this kind of thinking movie, or those who appreciate if for what it is, a dark, unsettling, realistic story of mental illness. This means that the rating of 5 is misleading. My only criticism would be that it is a little slow to get going, but if you stick with it, and give it the attention it deserves, it is ultimately very rewarding. Terrific performance by the very promising actress Juno Temple as well.

Alicia (Juno Temple) arrives in Chile from the USA to visit her cousin Sara (Emily Browning) and her colourful group of friends. Tired from the long flight, Alicia's initial instinct is to get some sleep, but she's coerced by everyone else to join them straight away on their road trip. Sara jumps ship halfway along the journey to go back to Santiago to do an exam leaving Alicia with Sara's friends who are strangers to Alicia. However, Alicia isn't keen on Sara's friends which causes friction between Alicia and the rest of the group in her absence.There's nothing wrong with the concept here, but writer and director Sebastian Silva seems to lose interest very early on in attempting to flesh out Alicia's problems resulting from her sleep depravation. It might have been better if Silva would have spent more time focusing on how Alicia's sleep depravation was affecting her mind and perhaps offer more insight into her as a character. Instead he seems more content in creating a film which is mean-spirited for the most part and also puts a lot of his focus on the obnoxious and unlikeable supporting cast. Michael Cera is supposed to be the creepy, unnerving guy here, but he lacks the screen presence or the acting ability to really make this aspect work. He's nothing more than a creepy pervert (and an irritating one at that). The rest of the supporting cast fare no better with only Emily Browning managing to show a bit of gravitas with the limited screen time that she was given.The screenplay is also a complete joke and throws in many ridiculous scenarios; Sara disappearing back home to take an exam leaving Alicia with a bunch of strangers. What's even more strange is Alicia later gets a phone call from Sara saying that she knew this was going to happen (like she set her up for it), but then that thread was closed making me wonder what the point of it was? Worse still, we then see Alicia doing all kinds of things that are completely out of character which seemed to have stemmed from when she was hypnotised - OK you could say that somehow she may have become possessed following the hypnosis, but how and why? I'm all for films that leave you with things to think about, but it felt like Silva just couldn't be bothered putting any effort in and just left it for the audience to do all the work.The film ends in an open ended way which to me is always a bit of a gamble. It can work if the narrative and characters are fleshed out in such a way that it leaves you thinking about it at the end, However, the thin plot that was served up here meant that this was never going to be the case and it once again highlights the laziness of this film.Ending on a positive note, I thought that Juno Temple was excellent in her role. Accentuating vulnerability and naivety when required, but then effortlessly switching to her darker alter ego. She really was great and it is a pity that Silva gave her next to nothing to work with. Although Temple is a promising young actress and her performance makes some of this tolerable, the film as a whole is mean-spirited, obnoxious and not a particularly pleasant viewing experience.

Well, if you think that Iron Man is a great movie, then of course, Magic Magic will seem the most boring movie ever.In my case, I love simple stories, that present characters as real world people, with real-people problems and challenges, that allow us for introspection and learning.In the case of Magic Magic, we are presented with the downward spiral journey of a weak mind, triggered probably by the distance from home, the sight of a foreign land, and the overwhelming amount of environmental stimuli, which can be trivial for the rest of the characters.If we exercise our empathy just a bit, and look that world through the eyes of Alicia, we will find ourselves as witnesses of violent events that can harm us very deeply.The movie not only shows a very complex character in Alicia, but tests our sensitivity levels.A masterpiece with great acting, and a great lesson for all of us.