Critic Reviews
| 80 |
Village Voice
Jordan Harper
Following a hardworking, goodhearted man as life beats the hell out of him, this documentary is moving almost to the point of exploitation.
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| 80 |
LA Weekly
If this terrific documentary doesn't adjust your idea of what it means to have a hard life and a good attitude, you haven’t been paying attention.
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| 80 |
Los Angeles Times
Sam Adams
Pain, poetry and perseverance form the backbone of Mark Becker's compassionate, well-observed documentary.
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| 75 |
San Francisco Chronicle
A modest documentary, small in scope and ambition, but it achieves one of the higher callings of art in that it forces viewers to look at a something in a newer, deeper and more humane way.
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| 75 |
New York Post
Mark Becker's Romantico is beautifully realized on old-fashioned film. And that's only part of its charms.
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| 75 |
New York Daily News
It will be a long time before you forget the deep pain etched into the weary face of Carmelo Muñiz, the mariachi singer at the center of Mark Becker's immensely moving documentary.
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| 75 |
Boston Globe
The musician is candid about his own demons and gives the filmmakers access to his wife, two very different daughters, and, for a nicely done montage, his family photographs.
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| 75 |
Chicago Tribune
The value of Romantico is that it lets us experience vicariously what Carmelo and others like him go through.
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| 70 |
Variety
Engrossing pic is impressively shot, edited and scored.
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| 60 |
The New York Times
This modest, unassuming documentary about an illegal Mexican immigrant living in San Francisco is a case study of a life defined by poverty.
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| 60 |
Film Threat
Daniel Wible
Works best as a beautifully executed and inspirational work of self-sacrifice.
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| 50 |
Chicago Reader
Peter Margasak
Carmelo, the central figure, returns home when his mother's health begins to decline, and his love of family, something of an abstraction in the first part, leaves him deeply divided: he wants to care for them personally, but he can better provide for them by returning to the U.S.
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| 50 |
The Onion (A.V. Club)
There's nothing extraordinary about mariachi singer Carmelo Muñiz Sánchez, and nothing extraordinary about Mark Becker's documentary profile Romántico.
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