Product Description

Based on the bestselling novel by Nobel Prize winning author, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, comes an epic love story that spans a lifetime, set against the breathtaking backdrop of South America during the turn of the century. When a teenage Florentino Ariza sees Fermina Daza for the first time, a spark of youthful infatuation ignites a romance that will carry the two from intoxicating highs to desperate lows over the next 50 years, in the film that dares to ask; How long would you wait for love?

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #8837 in DVD
• Brand: Warner Brothers
• Released on: 2008-03-18
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds
• Running time: 139 minutes

Features

• Based on the bestselling novel by Nobel Prize winning author, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, comes an epic love story that spans a lifetime, set against the breathtaking backdrop of South America during the turn of the century. When a teenage Florentino Ariza sees Fermina Daza for the first time, a spark of youthful infatuation ignites a romance that will carry the two from intoxicating highs to desperat

Amazon.com
There's no reason an Englishman shouldn't take on a landmark in Latin American literature. Four Weddings and a Funeral, after all, proves Mike Newell has a feel for romance. Adapted by The Pianist's Ronald Harwood, Love in the Time of Cholera is an epic vision of true love. For all the talent involved, however, this lush realization of the Gabriel García Márquez novel never takes flight. Newell begins with a death before backtracking 50 year to the late-1800s, with Florentino (Unax Ugalde), a poetry-writing telegraph operator living in an unnamed city (the movie was filmed in Cartagena, Columbia) who spots the graceful Fermina (Giovanna Mezzogiorno) while making his rounds, and that's it--he's in love. While Florentino's mother (Central Station's Fernanda Montenegro) encourages the courtship, Fermina's father (John Leguizamo in over-the-top mode) forbids it. Years pass, and the well-born Dr. Urbino (Benjamin Bratt) treats Fermina for a case of cholera. Then, Urbino proposes. Fermina accepts. A distraught Florentino (now played by Javier Bardem) decides to wait. With the help of his uncle (a sprightly Hector Elizondo), he amasses wealth of his own. All the while, he drifts from woman to woman. After five decades of waiting, he gets a second chance to win Fermina's heart, and it's easier said than done. Florentino's journey is absorbing, but Newell's film lacks the passion and complexity of Marquez's prose. The actors give it their all, but Love in the Time of Cholera is more of a pleasant diversion than a life-changing experience. --Kathleen C. Fennessy

Customer Reviews

Gabriel García Márquez' novel 'El amor en los tiempos del cólera' without the Magical Realism
For devotees of Gabriel García Márquez this unprofessional adaptation of his sweepingly romantic novel 'El amor en los tiempos del cólera' will sadly disappoint. Ronald Harwood's screenplay is a patchwork quilt that attempts to tell the story of longing for love in the manner of a novella/travelogue and despite the presence of some very fine actors in the key roles, director Mike Newell forgets to grasp the atmosphere that makes the original novel ethereal.

Young Florentino Ariza (Unax Ugalde) is a poor dreamer working as a telegraph operator and sees and falls in love with young Fermina Daza (Giovanna Mezzogiorno), daughter of a wealthy mule trader Lorenzo Daza (John Leguizamo) who upon hearing of the infatuation whisks Fermina away as Florentino pledges undying love and fidelity to Fermina. Florentino's mother Tránsito (Fernanda Montenegro), his uncle Leo (Hector Elizondo), and his friend Lotario Thugut (Liev Schreiber) comfort him and try to encourage his mating with another woman, but as Florentino matures (now Javier Bardem) even the long list of sexual encounters cannot turn his mind away from Fermina. Fermina marries Dr. Juvenal Urbino (Benjamin Bratt), travels widely, has his child and ultimately discovers her husband's infidelity. Florentino inherits his Uncle's shipping wealth, becoming one of the wealthy class that would have made him an eligible suitor for Fermina when he originally met her. But time changes everything except Florentino's commitment to Fermina and after the death of Dr. Urbino, he has the chance to realize his long awaited dream of being with the now 70+ year old lover.

The story spans fifty years in an unnamed city in Colombia (here Cartagena) and across the beauty of both South America and Europe. All of the basic elements are in place: the important missing piece is the magic of Gabriel García Márquez's prose. The huge cast is wasted on a script that is less than pedestrian: Javier Bardem tries to make Florentino a credible sympathetic character but is stuck in the mud of his lines; the brilliant Fernanda Montenegro attempts to paste together the pared down role of Florentino's mother; an unremarkable Giovanna Mezzogiorno fails to make Fermina worthy of Florentino's devotion; John Leguizamo is grossly and embarrassingly miscast; fine actors such as Unax Ugalde, Liev Schrieber, Catalina Sandino Moreno, Ana Claudia Talancón, Hector Elizondo and others are little more than cardboard caricatures of the original creations.

One wonders how Newell and Harwood could have strayed so far from the mark of the potential that this beautiful novel promised as a cinematic transition. But what resulted from their collaboration is an overlong, boring, and sloppy version of the original story. Sad to see fine actors wasted in this film. Grady Harp, March 08

It brings up the theme of aging!!!
Love in the Time of Cholera

Just about everyone appears to agree that the motion picture is a dreadful representation of the novel by the Nobel Price Winner, Gabriel García Márquez, Love in the Time of Cholera. It is obvious that this movie does not come close to the masterpiece on which it is based; however, it does bring to the audience some of the aspects of the theme of aging that are depicted in the novel. It brings up, for instance, the infirmity of loss of memory suffered by Tránsito Ariza, Florentino's mother, and the perspectives of other characters regarding the acceptance of love in mature ages. For instance, América Vicuña, Florentino's youngest lover, is extremely surprised when old Florentino conveys to her that he is going to marry, and Ofelia, Fermina's daughter, actually believes that love was disgusting or "revolting" at mature ages. Nevertheless, the motion picture does an outstanding job at depicting the fact that the love of the elderly is entirely acceptable, understandable, and sublime. Florentino and Fermina indeed get pleasure from their mature love in spite of their outer appearances and relative physical fragility. The movie conveys that the elderly are still young at hearth and that is all what is essential.

a good movie
After reading all the negative reviews on this movie, I wasn't sure I wanted to see it. I loved the novel, and now am a fan of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's works. I was pleasantly suprised that the movie kept true to the novel, and very much pleased with the actors that brought the charaters in Marquez's book to life. The scenery is spectacular, and the cinematography is breathtaking. Its worth watching and judging for yourself, as Oscar Wilde once said..."One man's poetry is another man's posion".