Slow pace in the most part of the movie.

Pretty Good

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

This is a film that tackles a lot of things. One is, of course, the love story between Lala and Ailín, which was in danger of taking a back seat when this huge event happens — that is always a danger in LGBT and/or women-led films by the way, but in here, it wonderfully does not. Another is race, class, privilege, and the justice system. The issues shown here about Argentina are not anomalies. While all of these and more could've been better-crafted, this film is still definitely a gem. I like Director Lucia Puenzo's choices to tell this specific story about these specific characters, when other directors could've chosen easier ways out. I can't wait to watch more from her.

It sounded interesting; almost like an Argentine version of "Heavenly Creatures" - but in the end "The Fish Child" fails to live up to the promise that it seems to have. The story revolves around the teenage daughter of an Argentine judge and his wife, who falls in love with the family's Paraguayan maid. The two plot to run off together to Paraguay, to live in a house by a lake, but things don't turn out as planned when the judge is killed. There's not a lot of mystery about his killing; there is a lot of intrigue about the past - particularly the maid's past - but somehow the movie seemed kind of choppy to me (perhaps the result of subtitles) so that it didn't really draw me in particularly well.The strongest part of the movie is probably the performance of Ines Efron as the judge's daughter. She was quite good and convincing in the role. Mariela Vitale was also quite good as the maid.That said, the movie still disappointed a bit. (4/10)

excerpt, full review at my location - The writer/director of the synopsis- defying Argentine intersexuality melodrama XXY follows up her directorial debut with this adaptation of her own novel. With Inés Efron returning as another gay protagonist, Puenzo this time treads more traditional ground with her lesbian noir drama, but is the result Argentina's answer to the Wachowshi brothers' Bound or a case of a difficult second album depreciating the promise of the first?There's plenty of intrigue in this film for it to be of interest, and while it often fails to deliver on its promises, Lucía Puenzo is not on the list of Argentine directors you'd be wise to ignore. But given her impressive prior work, The Fish Child represents an overall disappointing work from an artist we've been given reason to expect more from.

Everything is going wrong in this upper class family of Buenos Aires except the irregular love of the daughter for her Paraguayan maid. Lucia Puenzo's second opus (an adaptation from her own book) is even more audacious than her debut XXY.Surfing through the classical genres (melodrama, thriller, sexploitation, voyage of self-discovering) she find her way to tell this poignant story of love and desire. It's also a denounce about the abuses of political power and everyday xenophobia. Superb performances from both leading ladies and the general cast, gloriously photographed and rightly directed. One of the great titles of 2009.