Product Description

A band of street urchins have great hopes as Christmas eve is getting close. Will they spend it among pals? Or with their suitors? Will they have enough dough to scare up their own party? Will they be wearing new clothes that night? All these expectancies, which won't materialize in the end, are to bring about a somewhat nefarious ending: loneliness, despondency, drugs and death. Hidden face of a cruel, intense latinamerican city. En la noche de navidad, Mónica vende rosas para ganarse la vida y para comprarse el sueño de una fiesta con pólvora, estrenar ropa y salir con su novio... pero la vida le depara una nueva cita con la soledad, la pobreza y la muerte. Mónica es la otra cara de Medellín, una ciudad como cualquier otra en donde los niños de la calle que no tienen lugar en este mundo viven el tiempo inútil de su inexistencia.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #37259 in DVD
• Released on: 2003-11-18
• Rating: Unrated
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Color, DVD, Subtitled, NTSC
• Original language: Spanish
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 116 minutes

Customer Reviews

Disturbing
This is an unbelievable film. "...Rosas" is graphic and truly disturbing as it captures the squalid life of the gamin in Medellín, Colombia. The children lead a life of sex, drugs, and prostitution without compunction. They are the sad result of broken homes. The film is a commentary on how the war on drugs has lead to the neglect of Colombia's poor. The irony of it all, the children are not hooked on cocaine but glue. They sniff the stuff out of paper bags, slowly depleting their young brain cells every time they use it. A very disturbing, yet enlightening, film. It brings awareness to a growing problem in Colombia and questions the results of the Colombian government having to concentrate its efforts fighting the drug cartels and guerrilla insurgents rather than concentrating its efforts rehabilitating the children who will surely wind up contributing to the drug-insurgency problem in the future. The kids in the film did a wonderful job in their performance, really good acting, and the directing was very sharp, weaving the different subplots seamlessly without having to clumsily intersect them. The film is in a sense a docudrama. Even though the film is not as effective as "Children of God," the film does succeed in making the viewer aware that there is more to the troubles in Colombia besides the things your read about in the New York Times.

A True Masterpiece of Latin American Cinema
This is a heart-wrenching film about children in poverty, focusing on a girl who sells flowers to survive. It is a "feminine" or feminist (perhaps) counterpart to the same director (Victor Gaviria)'s earlier film, "Rodrigo D: No Future" and one should ideally watch both. I was enormously moved when I saw this film for the first time. An important predecessor for other neo-realist Colombian films such as "Our Lady of the Assassins" and "Maria Full of Grace."

Eye Opener
This movie is a must see.. it definitely shows the effects that children with poor family structure can easily be veered into negative influences like drugs, prostitution, homelessness etc.. in search for a loving relationship or just some attention.. I would definitely recommend parents show this movie to adolescents as an eyeopener...Both can learn from the movie..