the audience applauded

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

This film conceived, written, produced and directed by the renowned Francis Ford Coppola is empty and pointless. There are good performances, good cinematography, and directorial skills are in evidence. But why bother? Yes, there is atmosphere. But it is dark and depressing. The story has a germ of an idea to it, but what has happened to Coppola's writing abilities? He has in the past written such important screenplays. I suggest that Francis has nothing to say at the moment. Let us hope that his situation will improve, that he will pull himself together, and find something interesting and worthwhile to say. He is also in danger of becoming pretentious, possibly because he has been praised too much and for too long and is starting to believe in it. Waiting for him to recover from this is a bit too much like imagining Samuel Beckett's 'Waiting for (Jean-Luc) Godard'.

If Alden Errenreich does not become a future star, it will be a big surprise to me. Watch him in Tetro made me think of a young Leonardo De Caprio. Not that De Caprio is an aging actor, but he is not 21 years of age anymore. I do not know if I have his name spelled correctly, but it will be motion pictures loss if he is not a future star, that is what I see.Instead of going into plot as many might do, I will just suggest that this is Coppola looking back at his life, and perhaps the lives of others. watching Klaus Maria Brandauer, I could not but help think of Marlon Brando, a genius of an actor, but not in life. The relationship of this maestro with his brother, also played by Brandauer, the brother reminded me of Alfredo from The two Godfather classics. Certainly, also watching this film, one cannot help but remember Coppola's Rumble Fish, which I do think was a little better than Tetro. His love for The Red Shoes and Tales of Hoffman is also evident, (I think Francis thinks Tales is the best film ever made).A highlight of the film, and who knows, the more people see this film, the more people will want to go to Argentina during their winter time to go to Patagonia, breath taking black and white photography. Also the awards banquet is certainly a dig at such award shows, and he also may be giving a critical jibe to a famous American female talk show host who in the past, when she would tout a book would almost immediately become a best seller.Tetro is not Coppolas best film by a long shot. It lags at times, sometimes I was a little bored, but it is interesting most of the time, and worth ones while to watch.

When two estranged brothers are reunited in Buenos Aires a story unfolds as truths are told, history revisited and the future rewritten. Glorious in it's black and white, Francis Ford Coppola has woven together a huge, operatic styled film with a beautiful, yet sad tale of family at it's heart.It is often breathtaking in it's imagery; light flickers across faces, each frame looks exquisite and the camera places itself at angles that give a entirely new perspective. Alden Ehrenrich is beautiful upon the screen and portrays the younger brother Bennie wonderfully. Older brother Tetro is aloof and almost mean and is actually well played by Vincent Gallo. Another great performance is by Maribel Verdu as the ever supportive woman in Tetro's life.The story is immense, and the past is gradually revealed and usually and at first oddly in contrasting colour. These flashbacks I found annoying because they were in colour, yet as the film progresses a touch of surrealism enters the film as flashbacks are told in colour but also in the form of dance adding to the operatic, theatrical feel the film gathers as it progresses. It is an amazing achievement, the dance sequences are beautiful and sublime. As is the film's score, at times the use of opera and classical pieces couldn't be more perfect and add a wonderful sense of feeling to the film. I was so throughally enraged by the film I could barely take my eye from the screen.It is rare that I come away from a film, wanting to see it again, but with Tetro I did. It is a film full of beauty, emotion and tragedy. One that tells a great story and does so with great visual style. Brilliant stuff More of my reviews at my site iheartfilms.weebly.com

Francis For Coppola has created a major cinematic miracle in his TETRO. The film is hauntingly beautiful to see, to hear, and to challenge the minds of the viewers. This is what great cinema is all about - taking the risks of storytelling to the impossible extremes available to only the great writer/directors such as Federico Fellini, Alain Resnais, Alexander Sokurov, François Truffaut, Jean Renoir, Akira Kurosawa, Ingmar Bergman, and Luis Buñuel. Heady company, this, but Coppola rises to the occasion with this multilayered exploration of family secrets and the dissection of the concept of 'genius' - all in the quiet guise of autobiographical references that make this work more than simply one of his many successful films. He has the grace to select artists of his own caliber to assist him: the cinematography (as complex a marriage of rich black and white and stunning color as anyone has achieved) is by Mihai Malaimare, Jr.; the musical score is by the brilliant Argentinean composer Osvaldo Golijov whose atmospheric compositions mesh perfectly with the influential moments of Puccini, Brahms, Offenbach, and Delibes; and a group of actors whose range of talent spans decades of experience and levels of finesse. It all works to one end, and that end is a celebration of a master's art of making memorable film. The setting is Buenos Aires where Tetro (Vincent Gallo), a writer of plays and novels, all incomplete and written in code and confusing manner - never having published any of his output, lives with Miranda (the brilliant Maribel Verdú), a doctor at the 'insane asylum' where she met Tetro as her patient. Into this shadowy place steps Benjamin (Alden Ehrenreich) who has run away from military school and is working as a waiter on a cruise ship docked in Buenos Aires for repairs. Benjamin seeks out his half brother Angelo (Tetro's discarded name) to try to find out about his confusing and dysfunctional family. Benjamin worships his older brother who taught him all the important aspects of art and life before Tetro disappeared, shunning the family that birthed him. Miranda convinces Tetro to allow Benjamin to stay with them despite the fact that Benjamin represents the family he deserted. Benjamin discovers the writings of his brother and manages to de-code them and writes an ending for a play that Tetro never finished. The play is produced by a small but adventuresome theater run by one Jose (Rodrigo De la Serna) and enacted by Abelardo (Mike Amigorena) and Josefina (Leticia Brédice). Upon hearing this Tetro is enraged and begins to relate the truth about the family that produced both boys - crux of which is the father figure Carlo Tetracini (Klaus Maria Brandauer) who sole claim to 'genius' in the family is his power as one of the most revered orchestral and opera conductors in the world. The remainder of this complex story unwinds the secrets long held within the family and the truths discovered by Benjamin alter his life and his perception of family and love and commitment. Many of the secretive portions of the story are revealed not only in flashbacks of the family, but also in full color dance and theater sequences focusing on 'Coppelia' and 'Tales of Hoffmann', subtle suggestions to the audience of the truths yet put into words by the actors. These sidebars are brilliantly executed and designed and performed and beg for more time on the screen. If the last portion of the film is a bit slow (a flaw comfortably corrected by the presence of the great Carmen Maura as the preeminent judge of taste and talent who goes by the symbolic name of 'Alone'), this gives the audience time to assimilate all of the information that has been inexorably revealed throughout the course of the film. TETRO is film-making at its finest. It demands much from the audience, but its rewards are considerable. Highly recommended. Grady Harp