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The Lost City

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The Lost City (2006)

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Reviews Counted:82

Fresh:21

Rotten:61

Average Rating:4.7/10

Consensus: Its heart is in the right place, but what starts as a promising exercise devolves into an overlong, unevenly directed disappointment.

Rated: 15

Runtime: 2 hrs 23 mins

Genre: Dramas

Theatrical Release:05-12-2008

Synopsis: The Lost City is actor/director Andy Garcia’s bittersweet lyric celebration of Cuban culture that took him 16 years to make. Using music, literature and dance, City captures Havana in full... The Lost City is actor/director Andy Garcia’s bittersweet lyric celebration of Cuban culture that took him 16 years to make. Using music, literature and dance, City captures Havana in full tropical bloom during the late 1950s. Where Buena Vista Social Club commemorated an era of Cuban music before it slipped away, City captures the moment where performers like Beny More electrified audiences with that rhythm, a rhythm that made Havana the Pearl of the Antilles. Scripted by Cuban writer Guillermo Cabrera Infante, whom critic David Thomson likened to Jorge-Luis Borges and Gabriel Garcia Marques, City builds like a vivid tropical fever-dream; a love story and revolution set to music. Centered in El Tropico, a nightclub roughly modeled after Havana’s famous Tropicana, proprietor Fico Fellove tries to hold his family and club together as the dictator Batista’s reign of terror comes crashing down around him. Ultimately, to survive, Fico must leave everything he loves. City is every immigrant’s story—a paean to lost culture. It’s a time and place in history that still lives vividly in the imagination of the exile. And as conjured by Infante and Garcia, this is a land where rhythm can’t be exiled. You can leave the country, but the rhythm will never leave you. Along with its original score, City sings with 40 different songs. Mambos, chachachas, rumbas, toques, danzones, boleros. Together they create an oral history of Cuba. They are love songs to an indomitable culture—a culture that reveals itself in music, but also in dance, in poetry, in Catholicism, in African and European heritages, in Revolution, in tobacco, in Santeria and the azure sky and water that surround the island. These are the residents of The Lost City. -- © Lions Gate Films [More]

Starring: Andy Garcia, Dustin Hoffman, Bill Murray, Inés Sastre

Starring: Andy Garcia, Dustin Hoffman, Bill Murray, Inés Sastre, Jsu Garcia

Director: Andy Garcia

Director: Andy Garcia
Screenwriter: G. Cabrera Infante
Producer: Frank Mancuso
Studio: Lions Gate Films

[See More Credits]

Reviews for The Lost City

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21 - 40 (sorted by date; UK critics are listed first)
Text View | |< << 1 2 3 4 5 >> >|
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Book-ended by fine songs; in between, Garcia offers more than two hours of clumsy Coppola/Scorsese karaoke...

Full Review Source: Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN) | comment Comment
06/26/06
John Beifuss
John Beifuss
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)

Even though the movie is made with an abundance of heart, it's sad to report that the final result has only a weak pulse.

Full Review Source: Austin Chronicle | comment Comment
06/24/06
Marjorie Baumgarten
Marjorie Baumgarten
Austin Chronicle

It's handsome and heartfelt but mired in murky politics, plot inertia, musical montages and painfully pointed symbolism.

Full Review Source: Houston Chronicle | comment Comment
06/23/06
Bruce Westbrook
Bruce Westbrook
Houston Chronicle

Garcia needed better guiding hands and eyes in the editing room to jettison the many parts that bog down the story.

Full Review Source: Associated Press | comment Comment
06/23/06
David Germain
David Germain
Associated Press

... when it finds its footing, it becomes the movie it longs to be. And that happens often enough to make it worth finding, even when it seems as lost as the city it loves.

Full Review Source: Las Vegas Review-Journal | comment Comment
06/23/06
Carol Cling
Carol Cling
Las Vegas Review-Journal

Unsteady but often entrancing.

Full Review Source: Arizona Republic | comment Comment
06/22/06
Bill Muller
Bill Muller
Arizona Republic

Somehow simultaneously too much and not enough. At 143 minutes, it well overstays its welcome as a movie, but with a little more fleshing out it might have worked as a miniseries.

Full Review Source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution | comment Comment
06/22/06
Eleanor Ringel Gillespie
Eleanor Ringel Gillespie
Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Turgid, lumpy and almost unwatchably dull.

Full Review Source: Toronto Star | comment Comment
06/16/06
Geoff Pevere
Geoff Pevere
Toronto Star

It's a potent work, enlivened by fabulous Cuban music and Garcia's obvious love for his land and his culture.

Full Review Source: Rochester Democrat and Chronicle | comment Comment
06/16/06
Jack Garner
Jack Garner
Rochester Democrat and Chronicle

Unfortunately, Garcia is inept as a director. His scenes are shapeless and bloated with self-important speeches.

Full Review Source: Globe and Mail | comment Comment
06/16/06
Liam Lacey
Liam Lacey
Globe and Mail

Unfortunately, the broad scope leads to a tedious pace, as Garcia lacks the restraint to match his keen visual eye.

Full Review Source: Denton Record Chronicle (TX) | comment Comment
06/14/06
Todd Jorgenson
Todd Jorgenson
Denton Record Chronicle (TX)

It's barely coherent as it is, but at 2 hours and 23 minutes, The Lost City is simply infuriating.

Full Review Source: Orlando Sentinel | comment Comment
06/09/06
Roger Moore
Roger Moore
Orlando Sentinel

Too scattered, too confused, too patched-together to work dramatically.

Full Review Source: Detroit News | comment Comment
06/09/06
Tom Long
Tom Long
Detroit News

The movie has too many stories to tell and tells none of them very well.

Full Review Source: Detroit Free Press | comment Comment
06/09/06
Terry Lawson
Terry Lawson
Detroit Free Press

Our cue that Garcia is acting is when he furiously bats his eyes in his smoldering emotional scenes. Either that, or he's allergic to the smoke from all those Cuban cigars.

Full Review Source: Boulder Weekly | comment Comment
06/02/06
Thomas Delapa
Thomas Delapa
Boulder Weekly

For a film rooted in the director's own experience, The Lost City is surprisingly unilluminating.

Full Review Source: Orlando Weekly | comment Comment
06/01/06
Mark Jenkins
Mark Jenkins
Orlando Weekly

Garcia's fans and viewers who love Cuban music will probably enjoy The Lost City if they don't mind the long run time.

Full Review Source: ReviewExpress.com | comment Comment
05/29/06
Diana Saenger
Diana Saenger
ReviewExpress.com
N/R

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch | comment Comment
05/27/06
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Listening to the soundtrack would likely provide a better artistic experience than watching this predictable plot play out.

Full Review Source: San Diego Metropolitan | comment Comment
05/27/06
Jean Lowerison
Jean Lowerison
San Diego Metropolitan

If you want to see a good, entertaining movie about Havana, circa 1958, better to rent Havana, than waste your money on this turkey.

Full Review Source: tonymedley.com | comment Comment
05/27/06
Tony Medley
Tony Medley
tonymedley.com
 
 
21 - 40 (sorted by date; UK critics are listed first)
Text View | |< << 1 2 3 4 5 >> >|
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