A gentle movie about relationships between three women. (Yes, I say three women as Mary lived with Bishop and Lota until the latter die.) And as every human relationship it is permeated with high, low and ... drama moments. When it comes to women it seems that directors never forget the drama. Blend together alcoholism, passion, money and drama and you have a genuine, feasible film, if based on true events.It feels that the characters lack in depth a little bit, but in this movie that was a good thing to me since the movie did not intend to replicate accurately the events (hence it is not possible to truly know what happened) . Therefore, t is up to the viewer to infer the finest nuances of those people based on the most general outlines shown in the film.It is a film to be savored and reflected as the years pass by within the plot.

Reaching for the Moon (2013)Wonderful! The story of the Brazilian years of the great North American poet, Elizabeth Bishop. There are so many beautiful aspects to the characters, their setting, and their relationships it's hard to know where to begin. And even better, on top of all this, is the historical recreation of the times, and the changing political climate of Brazil. It's touching and uplifting and tragic. The original title of this is "Flores Raras" because these were indeed rare people, and doing beautiful things. And yes, they were reaching for the moon but you might rather say they reached the moon. Succeeding at something is more than literally fulfilling.The plot has a slightly meandering, unfamiliar arc through the main events, and there are times when you think one thing and then suddenly another happens. Don't blame bad writing, but rather realize that this is how life is, and how it really was. Remember as well that these are artists of privilege at work, they have money and education and act with a kind of license and liberation that we all should feel. And so it's unpredictable.As a kind of true insight into the poetic process you might find few parallels in the movies. You learn their temperaments, and how circumstances make the artist and the poet come to their best. The intimate circumstances are about love, a really true deep love that grows between these two women. Their professional needs reinforce and conflict with their personal needs, but they make it work. The outside circumstances are hard to understand from 2014. Brazil was once a very different country, filled with far more freedom and sense of liberation. (This seems to be a direction that are pointed in again, though going through fits and starts.) But the world in post-War Brazil was one of possibility. It was a haven (not just for ex-Nazis) and a growing "New World," but it was also stuffed with poverty (which the movie ignores), a legacy still at hand.And this is exciting stuff. The movie moves mostly through the confines of their big, gorgeous estate in the hills, but it also shows us the city, and the larger world. So Bishop and Lota de Macedo Soares, an important architect of the era. grow and suffer and see their world fall apart around them (Brazil fell under dictatorship in the mid 1960s). It's filmed with utter beauty, the acting is sharp and convincing, and the writing (not surprisingly) is fluid and tight. Great stuff.

Reaching for the Moon is the kind of movie everyone hopes for but no one makes: a gay romance where "gay romance" is not the premise. Director Bruno Barreto focuses instead on how Elizabeth Bishop and Lota de Macedo Soares challenged and changed the world and each other in other ways, and that was absolutely the right choice - these women and their story are fascinating and make for top class entertainment.And it is entertaining. Considering the characters' issues and the story's ending it could have been drab, but the film is always lively and engaging. It flies by. Bishop takes herself very seriously, but Barreto maintains a sense of humor about it and makes fun of her just enough to keep her melodrama under control. An added bonus is that Miranda Otto gets to show off her underrated and underused comedic chops; one particular drunk scene is priceless. Glória Pires is dynamic and fiery as Lota but Otto is the real star, channeling Greta Garbo and Deborah Kerr in a gracefully commanding performance. She doesn't shy away from Bishop's spikiness, but her screen presence is so compelling that as much as we might be frustrated with her character, we can't take our eyes off her. Thanks to her constantly surprising performance, an eclectic ensemble cast, breathtaking visuals, and assured direction, Reaching for the Moon pulses with energy and is a breath of fresh air in an era of stuffy and bland biopics. Highlights: Shots of Rio de Janeiro that belong on postcards; a performance from Miranda Otto that would have won an Oscar in 1937; the assertion that some things are more important than whether a person is gayVerdict: Watch this with your parents instead of Blue Is the Warmest Color

Elizabeth Bishop and her lover Lota de Macedo Soares must have had a pretty rocky relationship—Lota ended up killing herself—but you'd never know it from this very prim and proper biopic. The filmmakers tone down any elements that might disturb or challenge a target audience looking not for historical accuracy (or even good drama) but rather for inspiring role models. So Bishop and de Macedo Soares are shown as two strong, successful, and loving women who never let little problems like raging alcoholism, rampant ruling-class careerism, or crushing egomania get them down, until the final reel, when the whole movie comes off the rails.Consider the scene where Elizabeth bakes a birthday cake for her beloved, who stands her up. What happens when self-obsessed Lota finally shows up, only to find Elizabeth sleeping off a bender? "Oh, you so hurt my feelings!" "Oh, so sorry, lovey-poo!" A little kissy-kissy and it's all better. Sorry, I ain't buying it. How much closer to the truth (not to mention more interesting, and believable) if this scene had erupted in a screaming row a la "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?", with the bitter, alcoholic American vs. the brazen Brazil nut. Alas, that would never do in a movie that's all about role models, not real people who really lived, and really ended up in mental hospitals and really committed suicide.When Lota does go certifiably crazy, this development seems to come from nowhere, since we haven't been shown a clue that anything was wrong with her or her perfect world. In real life, there's always a telltale breadcrumb trail leading to the nervous breakdown, but not in this movie. Lota just all of a sudden goes crazy. Go figure.Despite its glossy veneer, this is a deeply phony movie, a deceptive testament to a poet and an architect who both deserve to be more realistically portrayed on the screen. Maybe someday we'll see a competent documentary about these two women, their achievements, and their complex relationship, instead of this beautifully shot, polite and pandering excuse for a biopic.