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 biggest problem with this movie is it’s a little better than you think it might be, which somehow makes it worse. As in, it takes itself a bit too seriously, which makes most of the movie feel kind of dull.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

If you don't go by the poster of the movie(which portrayed it to be a passionate love story), you'd enjoy the movie.I haven't read the novel and I was engrossed very quickly with what was shown in the movie. The year is 1973 and Chile has been taken over by military coup. An woman talks to Francesco(a phychiatrist) about the nightmares she is having after military has tortured her and her husband. Her voice breaks as she says "one after another..again and again" Irene (Connelly) belongs to the upper class, she is innocent, engaged to her cousin, a military captain since childhood. She also publishes a magazine. She employed Francesco(Banderas) who is now out of job as the photographer. Francesco and his family are totally against the human rights violation that occurs. His brother is a priest in church who tries to prevent things.When the magazine crew went to interview Evangelina, a magical woman, military comes and interferes. Evangelina with superhuman strength picks up military commander Ramirez and throws him away. They left. Shortly after, Evangelina is taken by military and she has disappeared.Irene and Francesco tried to find out where Evangelina is. In the process, their lives and others take a complete turn-oil. And expectedly they fall in love.The scenes of military regime is very well depicted. The arrogance of their police, the fear among civilians are very real and touching. Of memorable scenes are Evangelina's friend in military who is torn between his job needs and the human ways.

The subject matter of this movie couldn't be anymore serious. This movie failed because the studio advertised this as a passionate movie between Antonio and Jennifer. The poster and box cover for the movie shows them engaged, half naked in the middle of an act of love. In the first 10 minutes of the movie, we see some kind of a foreplay situation between Jennifer and her cousin / lover. Then, the climax of the movie has nothing to do with the investigation they had been on. The movie peeks when both Antonio and Jennifer make love. While the one scene has been said to be the only good part of the movie, I must agree that the studios allowed the audience to believe that this movie was going to be packed with sex, sex, nudity, and more sex. You can't sell a box of cereal with a naked woman on the cover and then have the cereal filled with little marsh mellow religious figures of Christ and Saint Peter and Paul. Much like the cereal, the movie has its moments but fails to hold an audience because everybody is waiting for the sex scene. The movie tries to get serious but we are overwhelmed by the eye candy that is Jennifer and Antonio that we can't wait for the passion to take over.

The previous comment sounded to me like they weren't criticizing the movie. Sounded more like they were bashing the Country and the author...I found it was a good movie. I've seen better, but it's not at the bottom of my list, and neither is The House Of The Spirits. Of Love and Shadows is a book that explains in the background what was going on politically in Chile and it was a way to kind of get it out in the open - I don't know...create an awareness. I admit, it must be difficult to translate an amazing novel into a movie and have it come out the same. I find that Isabel Allende's books are absolutely fabulous!! She is a great story teller. And for this particular one, I also think you may need to have a bit more knowledge of what had happened in Chile to have a better understanding of what the story is about. The Movie - I enjoyed it...it deserves to be seen at least once, but...maybe..to get a better sense of what it's all about, it's best to read the book first! Maybe if this film was shot in Chile it would have been different using Chilean Actors that do an amazing job anyway. The movie may have been better. But I am glad that Antonio Banderas and Jennifer Connelly decided to be a part of this movie. Both are great actors that tried to give the movie feeling...

This was a great film!Granted, the acting may not be tip-top and the casting may have its flaws, but I thought that this was a great film, and it's about time we have more films bring to life the atrocities that occurred in Chile. By acquiring more knowledge about the world around us, we can try to ensure that we don't repeat the same mistakes over and over.I really thought the film was great!