The Body (2012)

> What if your plan is a small part of someone's big.

I wanted this film since it was out, only now I managed to see it. I haven't seen so many Spanish films as I did for French and German. I don't want to get disappointed, so I'm choosy and that is how it got delayed. That is the another reason why you don't see my low rated ('bad' and 'ignore' in my verdict) movie reviews. I don't want to waste my time to review bad films. Better late than never, and now, I don't regret for the wait. Anyway, the film was good, I enjoyed it and I wanted it to be one of my favourite from the year it got released, but a few things stopped me to consider that.

Okay, first of all, it was a casual start like any thriller flick. Slowly letting us know what it's all about, introducing the characters in order in a simple manner and then intense suspense emerges. The pace picks up when more and more puzzle pieces dropped on-board. By then, as a viewer you would begin to figure it out, applying theories you got. But it's not that easy to crack, because the film is not that stupid to give away any hints. Nowadays a certain section audience is a little extra cautious, especially since 'The Sixth Sense' and 'The Shawshank Redemption'. So this narration carefully maintains the tense parts.

> "I close my eyes and you're still with me."

Not until the film reaches the final act, where the twist happens and you will realise that you were nowhere near. Because the first two acts and the final were totally parted in narration except connected with the characters. The entire film revolves around a disappearance of a dead body from a morgue. The husband of the dead woman, a cop and others tries to solve the mystery in an overnight. And a few flashback pieces give us the necessity stories when the ongoing situation getting more tense.

I thought 'Gone Girl' was inspired by the first half of this film. After a little research I got to know that movie was based on the book of the same name that released around the same date when this film came out. But a very similar one, only the finale diverted to the other path and so the meaning of whole film changed. As a movie fanatic, I had collected some flaws for my review, but the movie took till the final dialogue to keep it that way and then solved it, leaving me empty handed.

So there are no second and third thoughts about the end, because that was separated from the rest of the movie and very clear to declare what has to be done. That means you don't have to go looking for defects, other than accepting as it is. The only choice you have to make is to express whether you liked the movie or not. And like I said in the first paragraph I enjoyed the film, but not the favourite one and I believe I explained the reason for that in other paragraphs. I absolutely recommend it for those who are looking for a suspense-thriller.

8/10

“Mayka” (Belén Rueda) is a wealthy woman with a toy-boy chemist for an husband “Álex” (Hugo Silva) and it’s not really the happiest of arrangements. She regularly baits him and threatens him with a divorce that would render him poverty-stricken. Then, suddenly, she has an heart attack and ends up on a mortuary slab - but not for long. Before they can carry out an autopsy, she’s gone awol. Policeman “Jaime” (Jose Coronado) is suspicious of the husband and his potentially venal motives but with no body there is a distinct paucity of evidence. With a thunderstorm almost perpetually raging overhead, we spend most of the next two hours playing a clever game of cat and mouse where it’s not always clear which is which. We are drip fed clues, counter-clues and red herrings enthusiastically by auteur Oriol Paula to ensure we remain engagingly perplexed and equally suspicious throughout. Can it really be a simple as it all seems at first glance? The mystery is expertly sustained and unlike many others of this genre where the plot is predicable, this one really does have us guessing right until a denouement that has something of the Agatha Christie meets the “Sting” to it. The production uses the dark and wet environments effectively (nobody here ever seems to want to turn on the lights) and Coronado with his fastidiousness, Rueda with her obnoxiousness and Silva with his smugness all work well as the mix of real-time investigations and flashbacks help us to fill in some of the plentiful blanks abetted by some noxious science for good measure. This is a proper thriller.