Chinese Take-Away
Kicking off with one of the most outrageous and surprising opening scenes in recent memory (or indeed, ever), this award-winning Argentinian film is a gentle character comedy with more substance than first meets the eye.
The great Argentinean actor Ricardo Darin (The Secret In Their Eyes; Carancho; Nine Queens) stars as a taciturn, embittered hardware storekeeper, Roberto, whose solitary life is turned upside down when he takes pity on a newly-arrived Chinese immigrant, dumped on the side of the road by an unscrupulous taxi driver. No good deed goes unpunished: Jun speaks no Spanish, and the address he brandishes for his only living relative turns out to be a dead-end. Roberto reluctantly allows him to stay in the spare room behind the store until the situation can be straightened out in the morning. But fate has other ideas…
"This is a gem of a film that once seen, will never be forgotten." Louise Keller, Urban Cinefile
"It is hardly possible to suggest how involving this story becomes… To a degree unusual in most films, I became involved in the fates of these men…I cared." 4 stars, Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
"A Spanish Amelie… Delightful… that rare gem." Adam Fresco, Flicks