User reviews

Based on the melodramatic novel by writer Prosper Merimee, Carmen is the classic tale of forbidden passion between a young man , sergeant named Jose (Leonardo Sbaraglia) and a spoken-for woman, Carmen (Paz Vega). A beautiful but amoral gypsy , marvellous Paz Vega, falls in turbulent love for a soldier , ever-so-handsome Leonardo , but things go wrong when his superior , becomes involved into the twisted affaire. It is told in flashback as the young soldier, stripped of his decorations, explains all in a prison cell to writer Prosper Merimee (Jay Benedict). José tells of the love he had for Carmen and how it proved to be destructive. As Carmen is victim and protagonist of a fatalist chain of events , passional romance and tragedies . Aranda splendidly casts the Spanish main actress of the moment , Paz Vega (The Spirit , Spanglish, Lucia y el sexo) , to play the immortal figure of Carmen in the kind of steamy role she revels in , with one of the most important players in Latin American Cinema today, Leonardo Sbaraglia (Intacto, Utopia) playing the character of José. To want her was Torture.. to love her meant death ! A story of beauty and savagery.. love and hate.. splendor and shame...

This romantic costume adventure strikes some strong sparks and uncontrollable passions . It is a decent movie , though corny and extremely erotic at times , but still entertaining to see sparks fly between Carmen/Paz Vega as the wonderful vixen and an always angry and jealous José/Leonardo Sbaraglia . Paz Vega in her real splendor plays an immoral gypsy hussy who ruins life of a young Spanish officer. The free, enigmatic nature of a woman called Carmen , her southern beauty , she's the complete and gorgeous starring displaying jealousy , bloodshed and doom . Paz Vega looks brilliant and stunning as the tempestuous gypsy , but also Leonardo Sbaraglia as a Spanish dragoon is pretty well , playing a passionate, impulsive character turning into into the victim . Support cast is pretty good , such as : Jay Benedict as Merimee who on a journey through Spain is forced by fate to be the witness of a story of passion , Antonio Dechent as the jealous bandit , Joan Crosas, Ismael Martínez, Ginés García Millán, Maria Botto, Josep Linuesa , Susi Sánchez, Paula Echevarria, Julio Vélez , among others . And Georges Bizet music might have helped a bit, rather than the rousing soundtrack provided by José Nieto. Adding a glamorous and picturesque cinematography by Paco Femina. The motion picture was well directed by Vicente Aranda .

There are several versions based on Prospero Merimee tale : First silent retelling ¨Carmen¨ 1915 by Cecil B De Mille with Geraldine Farrar, Pedro de Córdoba, Wallace Reid. ¨The Loves of Carmen¨ 1943 by Charles Vidor with Rita Hayworth , Glenn Ford , Ron Randell. ¨The loves of Carmen¨ with Dolores Del Río, Don Alvarado. ¨Carmen¨ 1944 with Vivían Romance , Jean Marais. ¨The Devil made a woman¨ 1959 by Tulio Demicheli with Sara Montiel, German Cobos , Amadeo Nazzarí. ¨Man, Pride and vengeance¨ 1967 by Luigi Bazzoni with Franco Nero, Tina Aumont, Klaus Kinski. ¨Carmen Jones¨ by Otto Preminger with Harry Belafonte , Dorothy Dandridge . ¨Carmen¨ 1983 by Carlos Saura with Laura del Sol, Antonio Gades .¨Carmen de Bizet¨ 1984 by Francesco Rosi with Julia Migenes , Placido Domingo, Ruggiero Raimondi . And this ¨Carmen¨ 2003 by Vicente Aranda with Paz Vega , Leonardo Sbaraglia, Antonio Dechent . Rating : 6.5/10 . Better than average . Worthwhile watching.

I, like one previous commentator, have never seen any other adaptation of Carmen, and, although the name rang a faint bell, hadn't really heard of the famous opera. Yes, I know, a total Philistine. I have to say that I liked this film. Of course Paz Vaga is beautiful, and I liked her interpretation of the fiery, part-Gypsy wanton woman in 1830 Spain. Although he seems to have received some criticism, I thought well of Leonardo Sbaraglia's performance. But, as a non-Spanish speaker, it is difficult to criticize an acting performance while reading subtitles. The photography, sets, and costumes all seemed to be done very well, and I hear that the actors did a creditable job with regional accents, something often laughable in American movies. Overall, it seems to me to be worth checking out.

Screen-wise, the story of 'Carmen' has lent itself to more than two dozen outings: the plot, with its core elements of jealous lovers, femme fatales and outlaws, being powerful (indeed, simplistic) enough to embrace several contemporary stylings, such as 1954's all-black Carmen Jones, 2001's 'Carmen: A Hip Hopera', and Jean-Luc Godard's 1983 film First Name: Carmen.

Similarly, while it's a popular misconception that 'Carmen' first flowed from composer Bizet's pen, the crowd-pleasing opera is just one of numerous interpretations, including dance and theatre productions, of Prosper Mérimée's 1847 source text.

Though a crowd-pleaser now, and a terrific enlivener of many a 'Classical Lite' compilation CD, opera-goers attending the 1875 premiere performance actually thought it less than the Bizet's knees, owing to its interminable chunks of dialogue, later expunged or set to music. It's those glorious songs we most associate Carmen with these days: and, tellingly, this version - a straight, self-important retelling of the novella - feels infinitely poorer for their exclusion.

As if anticipating the loss, director Aranda attempts to hold the interest during almost two hours of screen time, through full-frontal nudity, judicious smatterings of gore, and authentically course dialogue.

It's in this attention to earthy period detail that the filmmakers have really succeeded: the costumes, lighting and production design are uniformly excellent. For such a purist take, however, occasional liberties have been taken - some good, some indifferent. In a canny nod to the political climate of the age, the French soldier José has become Basque, although the use of flashbacks and the inclusion of Mérimée as a character in his own story doesn't add a great deal.

Most damagingly, the marked lack of eroticism, or sexual chemistry between Vega and Sbaraglia, is frankly baffling, while hysterical, near-burlesque turns are the order of the day. As the titular seductress, Vega resembles nothing as much as a nose-powdered catwalk model flouncing about with a broken heel.

If you start thinking about the set up in which this film is inserted, you will want to see it. At least i did it: This is an adaptation of a novel, by a french writer (immortalized in an opera by a french composer). The writer, Mérimée, was as well an historian-archaeologist-translator; meaning this, someone who cared for "exotism", in a time in which Spanish or Portuguese rural worlds were still considered exotic to the English and the french. That novel established the clichés and preconceptions regarding Spanish culture still considered these days (and efficiently exploited by the tourism industry). Bizet also helped establish other clichés, musical to that matter. But this film is Spanish, in production, creative minds and people involved. So this was a brilliant opportunity for a view into a distinct edge of Spanish culture described by a french and commented on by the Spanish. That was the motivation for me.

They started off quite well, and at least i think they gave a thought at what i mentioned. That's why they place Mérimée himself as a character, observing Andaluzia as a foreigner, and taking note of what he sees, even sharing space and scenes with Carmen and José. That was good, and i appreciated the audacity of crossing the line of the facts (if there ever was a real Carmen, Mérimée never got to know her).

But the problem is, they never step out of the very clichés Mérimée established. The film is visually as lush as the opera is musically. The sets are brilliantly baroque, the (excellent) production emphasizes passioned environments (operatic, as well), an orange/yellow deviating sexual mood. But they also emphasize the temperament of the characters a little too much, deviating the thing from what could have been better explored, something that could matter and that is in fact noted:

The drama is built around Carmen, and the inability for José to play the game according to her rules. Those rules are defined by cultural background, and that is where the frictions lie. Carmen comes from a branch of the Spanish culture, that transcends Spain. Gypsies, a group of nomads, a people that wouldn't, or couldn't adapt to the established norms the roman derived catholic based culture (that self and forced rejection still lasts today in most of the places). José is Basque, but that is little seen, he could be from Madrid, that in this case it would be the same, he is a cliché as well. So, it is those cultural differences that matter. This is, i mentioned, noted, but not made the center of the thing. They prefer remarking on the sensuality as the engine for the plot and sex as the motivation for the characters, that's why we have Paz Vega here, who had been in the brilliant sex-centered 'Lucía y el sexo' just 2 years before. Well she does deliver what they intended, and she is sensual for my contemporary and contextualized eyes. So it's not a matter of what they did here, but what they could have done.

Side note: one could also take Carmen as an early symbol for a female emancipation that would only really happen decades later. Is this something Mérimée observed, or something he included as part of his french more cosmopolitan way of thinking?

My opinion: 3/5

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This is a nice movie with good performances by Paz Vega and Leonardo Sbaraglia . Of course Vicente Aranda is a legend in Spanish Cinema and surely one of the great directors in Spanish cinema but I don't think this is one of his greatest movies even if it's fine. The screenplay plays with the introduction of Merimeé as a character , it's a nice touch but it's unbelievable. The music is composed by Jose Nieto , National Spanish Prize in Cinema. I mean this movie is very good in all the technical aspects .There are very good actors in supporting roles like Antonio Dechent , Maria Botto and others . I give it 7 out of 10 cause I think this could be a better movie but as it is it is not boring at all.

Before launching into whether this film is worth your time or not, I should inform you I've never seen another adaptation of Carmen, so if you're looking for a review on how it ranks amongst others, this might not be of much use to you.

The only time I've come across Carmen was on the car stereo when driving through Spain on a family holiday when I was a teenager. I didn't pay much attention to it because I didn't like opera at the time and I didn't know any better. The story has been around for 150 years or so. Do I feel I've missed out after seeing this movie? Yes, mainly due to the plot, but also because if all the actresses who played Carmen looked like Paz Vega, I would have all the adaptations happily sitting in my DVD collection.

Directed by Vicente Aranda (who also co-rewrote the story with Joaquim Jordà), the story is told through the eyes of the original author Prosper Mérimée, a French writer making his way through 19th century Spain. He comes across José (Leonardo Sbaraglia), a delinquent soldier and one of many men who fall in love with Carmen (Paz Vega), a sultry, sexy, bedazzling gypsy woman, who has the mouth of the devil, the temper of a 'toro' and who recklessly leads men to their doom. The moment she meets José, she is attracted by his stand-offish behaviour. But she hooks him, reels him in and lets him go, many-a-time. Until one day, José is wanted for murder. Carmen persuades him to join her band of gypsy smugglers. They seem to be settling, she's fallen in love with him, but she meets the charming Escamillo, the bullfighter. Can José hold his jealousy in check, or does it destroy him?

It's a beautiful,seductive story, something that resembles, almost, a Shakespearian or Ovid plot, with the portrayals of immense passion and emotion that can make or break us and transform us to do things out of character. It's poetic, fiery, and above all, slutty. I was left hanging on, I didn't know which way it was going to turn. I always hoped that José might change Carmen's dirty little ways. I won't tell you if he succeeded or not.

The above synopsis is what I took away from the film, but I was not impressed by the film itself. It was only after I watched it that I dug a little deeper into the story and I realised how much of a missed opportunity Aranda had made of retelling Mérimée's classic. It was a shallow, slutty period-drama blunder, that saw Paz Vega spend a lot of the time partially or completely naked (not that I'm complaining about this in particular!).

First of all, the acting was poor. I was not impressed by Sbaraglia as José. I'm still unsure whether he was a weak actor or José was supposed to be a weak character, I've not read the book. He's supposed to be a man who with burning desire for Carmen, but he spends much of the time looking confused, jealous and a bit dim. Paz Vega was slightly better as Carmen. I was convinced by her hardened, wicked character, although I have seen more convincing performances by her in other films, such as Zapping and Lucia y El Sexo. She seems too pretty to play a gypsy woman (not that I've come across many Andalusian gypsy women), so in a way, the role didn't really fit her. The other actors in the film weren't great either. They seemed to do everything half-heartedly. The story is passionate, emotive – they looked half-arsed, as if they couldn't wait to get out the tight 19th century costumes they were wearing.

However, the costumes, I was impressed with - one of the redeeming factors of the film. I like Spanish culture, I liked the soldiers' uniforms, the top-hats and the women's Flamenco dresses. They fitted the time well. That's all I can really say about that. Sorry, back to the criticism.

The script, as stated above, was co-rewritten by Vicente Aranda and Joaquim Jordà, and done so badly, so much that it would leave Mérimée turning in his grave. It was boring. It didn't make best use of José's intense passion for Carmen (or maybe that was just the acting). There were cheesy lines piled upon one and other, Satan and devil connotations everywhere, amongst the millions of swear words. I know the Spanish are partial for the odd swear word, but the film was littered with puta, 'whore', in literally every line Maybe it was realistic in 19th century poverty-stricken Seville, but the story itself didn't need it.

The editing and camera work was dull and ordinary. There was only one bit I actually liked, and that was when the camera follows a fly close-up in mid-air, which lands on Carmen's face. That was good. But the rest? Boring.

To conclude, it is sad to see such a great story go to waste with unconvincing acting and directing. If you're a literature teacher, by all means let your class watch this adaptation to get an idea of the story. However, only the male half of the class will be paying any interest to the film, thanks to Paz Vega. Otherwise, stick to the opera version (even though I hate musicals). I give this film 4, just for the fact I love the storyline! And Paz Vega!

Even for the non-opera loving public the name CARMEN is immediately recognized as an opera by Bizet about a gypsy girl whose capricious loves destroy men. But as much as the opera is now considered a staple in every opera house repertoire, the real story of the wild gypsy lass as created by Prosper Mérimée in 1845 has never been told as well as in this cinematic version by the abundantly gifted Spanish director Vicente Aranda ('Juana la Loca AKA Mad Love','Amantes', 'If they tell you I fell', etc.). Incorporating the author of the novel as a main character seeking the story of Carmen from one of her lovers - José - provides just the right vantage for the story of this famous gypsy wild lady to be told.

Carmen (the amazingly beautiful and talented Paz Vega) works in a cigar factory in Seville, a factory adjoining the military station where the very proper José (Leonardo Sbaraglia) is stationed. Carmen is tempestuous and in a fight instigated by a fellow factory worker bringing attention to the fact that Carmen is a gypsy, Carmen murders the co-worker and is arrested. José is physically attracted to the voluptuous Carmen and when Carmen flirts with him he consents to allow her to escape - his payback is the promise for a night of passion with Carmen. Carmen keeps her pact, providing José with his first sexual encounter, and José is doomed. His lack of military discipline results in his losing his rank and being imprisoned for a while, but at his release José encounters Carmen again, kills a fellow officer, and in fear runs off to the hills to live with the smugglers and gypsies that are Carmen's people. Many incidents occur to try the passionate bond between the lovers, but when Carmen's real husband is released from prison, destructive behaviors take over, behavior's that include Carmen's infatuation and affair with a bullfighter and the passion of Carmen and José comes to a tragic end.

One factor that makes the story (as adapted for the screen by director Aranda and Joaquim Jordà move so well is the role that Prosper Mérimée (Jay Benedict) plays: his questioning of José completes the story that Bizet's opera only outlines. The acting is superb, the cinematography by Paco Femenia and the excellent musical score by José Nieto contribute enormously to the success of this very fine film. This is a must for lovers of the opera Carmen, and a splendid action drama for those viewers who admire historical pieces. Highly recommended. Grady Harp

Carmen is a prostitute that lives seducing and stealing soldiers of the Spanish army; she is, without any doubt, the best femme fatale at the moment. When a man resist her charming attentions, she decides to do everything to destroy him. At the end, he falls in her web and he will be forced to make all the things he ever hated only for being with Carmen. Despite Paz Vega is very beautiful, she doesn't seem a gypsy (as Carmen is) and neither her acting nor Sbaraglia's are good. The story results very boring, and, in most moments, it is very absurd, while intending to appear truthful. in the same way are the scenarios and the Special Effects, despite not being but they are not but acceptable, and too much artificial for a historic film as it is. To sum up, boring and bad, with a very absurd development, there are much betters thing to watch.

Dull acting, weak script...worst spanish movie in years...I was

attracted by the (naked) beauty of Paz Vega, but as an actress

she's useless, you almost can't understand what she's saying...

About the story there's not much coherent to say...we heard of it

before, but as this is a "modern Carmen" we find a few changes: -The french soldier is now a basque soldier. -Merimee himself is a character in the story. -Carmen is a dangerous "bandolera" in love with a famous

"matador" and she can speak fluent basque...

Can anyone understand this mess?

The story of Merimée, in which inspired Bizzet for his famous Opera, tells us of a Gitana (Gypsy,Romaní) from Echalar, a small village to the North of Navarre, north of Spain. According to the Merimée fiction, Carmen and his mad lover spoke basque. So, this is not a mistake of the film, which, in many ways deserves, certainly, criticism: the film lack rhythm, and the actors are very bad indeed. I think, the opening scene, when all the women appear in the cigar factory, is great, a scene of great tension and furious wild force. Unfortunately, the "great expectations" this opening create on the spectator, are certainly not accomplished. The film goes wandering, without connection, without unity: the camera looks to too many stories and places, been not able to relate them to each other.

When I saw this in the cinema, I remember wincing at the bad acting about a minute or two into the first scene, then immediately telling myself "no, this has to get better". It didn't. The performances are pretty uniformly teak 'n pine and no, there is NO sexual chemistry in this film whatsoever, just the awkward posturings of a reasonably comely, discreetly talentless actress who seems born to grace the cover of "Interviú" and not much else besides. If the scriptwriter thought that making Mérimée a character was a stunningly original creative ploy he perhaps ought to get out more. And Aranda, if he'd given the matter a bit more thought, would have realised that the story of Carmen is just CRYING OUT for a thoughtful, iconoclastic, parodic deconstruction, not this leave-your-brains-at-the-turnstile affair of ersatz passion and comic-book dialogue. This is contemporary Spanish cinema at its worst.

There are several ways to misunderstand this movie and a couple of them have been shown in some of the past comments. This is a movie to be analyzed as a free recreation of a known subject and therefore not to be compared with the opera, the book or other Carmen movies seen before. It just stands for itself and I must say that this Carmen does it very well. It is a mistake to compare because that is the first step to deny movies the chance to be autonomous creative works of art. Vicente Aranda is a master of atmosphere and the art direction, the costumes and the photography are extremely well put together to achieve a pleasing aesthetic experience. Let's take it as it is.

And that brings us to the next misunderstanding. Someone complains about the typical Spanish clichés in the movie. Well, historically the movie is extremely well researched and you can see the results of that very serious work in every scene. It is not only an accurate portrait of the "black Spain" of knife and espadrille that Goya portrayed so vividly, but it's also of that part of history as seen by a foreigner fascinated with the folkloric side of that society. Honestly, anyone who doesn't want to see any cliché about Spain shouldn't buy a ticket to see Carmen, but in this case those clichés are presented before they became one and the way to see them is getting rid of our own prejudices.

Another important requirement to understand this movie properly is to speak the language. It is not acceptable to criticize any actor performance for not having understood his or her lines. If all the rest of the audience did, the problem most likely lies somewhere else. Paz Vega has an immaculate diction with her Andalusian accent and all she says is understandable and credible. Her Argentinian partner, Leonardo Sbaraglia, gives also a convincing portrait of the Basque officer that became a "bandolero", and her accent is very well learned.

No less important is to have a minimally open approach to the material. To say that Paz Vega is "horrible" suggests that the author of the phrase entered the theater for the wrong reasons. We already had in Spain a critic in one of the most prestigious papers that used to recommend us pictures he found homosexually arousing, without mentioning it explicitly. And that was not totally fair for the rest of us, especially for the ones that hadn't detected that the man was writing with parts of his anatomy that many readers didn't necessarily had to care for. I'm not suggesting at all that the reviewer had the same motivation, but the expectations must have been different as the ones of those among us that went to see a talented and beautiful actress play an almost classic role, because that's what we got. Paz Vega IS Carmen, and an excellent one, in Vicente Aranda's movie.

Another pretentious film from Vicente Aranda. If "Juana la loca" shinned of the same, at least its quality was superior (mainly thanks to the great performance of Pilar López de Ayala), but "Carmen" is boring and full of topics (ardent brunette with a dagger in the stocking, poor man dragged to madness due to passion, Sierra Nevada gangs, "toreros",...)

Obviously Paz Vega is a pretty woman, but about its talent there're more doubts, and Sbaraglia role is so stupid that results almost incredible. The script is weak and and Aranda's presumptuous character influences the entire film. With these ingredients the result could not be good.

Not the worst film I've seen, but a complete failure, in my opinion.

I thoroughly enjoyed Carmen, better than Original Sin (Angelina Jolie & Antonio Bandaras), which share some thematic similarities, and which I also enjoyed very much. I felt the acting was stronger here (Paz Vega displayed a wider range, has more fire; and Sbaraglia was also great). Overall, their acting was more gritty, more believable (less dreamy than Original Sin, and both actors here had less 'celebrity status' and 'pretty face' to depend on to make the movie work. Vega definitely sizzles, as to be expected.

Director Vincente Aranda has also built a detailed world (again, better than Original Sin) that lets you feel the grime and the daily goings-on of archaic Spain - for example, people unloading goods from a cart on the street, workers changing the candles of the street lamps, all in the background of the action.

Whilst I greatly sympathize with the recent idea of redeeming our femme fatals (like Brian de Palma's Femme Fatale), Carmen is a poignant, modern take in the tradition of the noir classic Double Indemnity, and is a delightful pleasure to watch. This is another fine example of the triumph of daring European cinema over glitzy and safe Hollywood fare.

This movie has been promoting in everywhere in Spain with a huge publicity campaign, after watching it, you realise that someone has stolen your money. Paz Vega is horrible as Carmen, she´s not natural at all and she looks like she´s making a fashion magazine cover in all the shots ("the best" is when she as an andalusian woman ...¡can speak basque and fluently¡, Leonardo Sbaraglia is much better than her as Jose, but the story is very slow, the plot don´t work, and the screenplay is really very very bad...I think Penelope Cruz (the film was written for her)would have been a much more credible and sexy Carmen.

What a waste of time and money

Vicente Aranda is one of the craftsmen of the Spanish cinema. And that is a guaranty. Even if the plot of the movie is not very original, you can count on finding something worth seeing in his movies.

Take Carmen as an example: we've been told this story a thousand times before, but introducing some interesting variations (like the fact that Merimée himself becomes a character) he makes you see the story from an other side. Moreover, I found some really fascinating images in the picture, specially those in which Paz Vega shows her original talent.

Like the other guy said It sux , you can count the words that have been said in that entire movie on one of your hands, Too nudity , she got naked like 7 or 8 times in a 1 and a half , well past the nudity you'll find a porno behind that film , He f**ked her all movie long, bad acting, bad story,bad language, Carmen was swearing all movie long , so you get out of that movie, pornografic scenes and dirty language, A lot of gaps in the movie, a big silence every now and then The only good thing in that movie is the beautiful places were it has been shot, otherwise it's an hour and a half of your life that you'll gonna waste so if u gonna watch that movie Good luck It really Sux

The story of a young officer, who fall in sizzling love with a tobacco factory worker told so distant and leisurely cinematic language that comes to mind: perhaps the matter is the advanced age of the director, that did not allow him to make the main theme of the movie what was considered his numerous predecessors - passion, jealousy, lust.

Senor Aranda actually deprived the most "Spanish" story in the history of the passions with which "Carmen" always associated. Despite the stunning views of Andalusia, Granada and Cordoba, against which the action is played out, watch what is happening on the screen simply uninteresting.

The plot, which became the basis for operas, ballets and numerous adaptations, turns into a specific, interesting mainly with the cultural and visual perspectives movie. Atmosphere of the time recreated with care. In particular, to work on the costumes was invited "Oscar"-winner Yvon Blake.

Obviously, the film with a similar scale, certainly deserves more serious cast. And if Paz Vega can be represented as Carmen, Antonio Deschamps is frankly not cope with the role, the duo looks extremely unconvincing. In general, the picture may be addressed to lovers of costume movies, hopeless romantics and those for whom the "Carmen" - is just a bouncy tune of Bizet's opera of the same name.

+ Costume adaptation of classic

• The lack of decent actors in the lead roles

Jose Nieto is the main reason thIs movie is great. Listen to the last song!!!

I want the soundtrack. The story is well done and filled with love and passion. But the music steals the show.

Remember JOSE NIETO!

Another bad spanish picture. This is very baaaad. I only save the photography and the music of José Nieto. The rest of the film is the worst I've seen in years. Paz Vega is horrible. Don't see it.

Ok I admit,this is not the best movie of european cinema...But even the worst could never reach the crappy level of the american one...Just go watch it cause it's european... Paz Vega is horrible but beautiful,you can never forget that...