Absolutely Fantastic

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

As a Cuban American who came over as a child with his parents in the mid 60's I heard all too often the stories of loss, pain, and the horrors witnessed and experienced by my family under the ruthless Castro regime. We lost the future my parents had worked so hard to setup for us. My parents had to leave everything behind, their business, their careers, their family and friends, to start a new from the bottom all while in their 50's. They arrived in a Country they had always loved from afar with high hopes, abandoning all they new to flee political persecution. They came with open hearts to build a new path, focused on insuring success for us their children. The Lost City captures the plight of Cubans from that era so accurately that it felt if it were telling my story. Andy Garcia does an amazing job conveying the loss so many experienced to then be welcomed to our new home, a place were we were given a new opportunity, not handed easy street, but given an honest chance to work hard and to become part of this great United States. Garcia a Cuban immigrant himself knows the pain, the loss, and is able to transfer that to film and to the viewer in a very effective way. My parents taught us to expect nothing but work hard to be worthy of this wonderful gift America had offered to us. They taught us to be respectful, and be worthy of America. This is the greatest nation on Earth and the Lost City reminds me and should all that that which we love, our home, our country, can be lost if we are not careful.

It's 1958 Havana, Cuba. Fico Fellove (Andy Garcia) is a prominent nightclub owner. His father is a respected university professor. The successful Fellove family struggles to agree on the political change blowing in the winds. His revolutionary brother Ricardo gets arrested and he gets an old friend Captain Castel to help. Ricardo is released and runs off with Che Guevara. Meyer Lansky (Dustin Hoffman) comes to him to turn his establishment into a casino. When he turns Lansky down, a bomb explodes killing his girlfriend. His other brother Luis gets in a plot to overthrow Batista and restore democracy. Luis is killed and he falls for Luis' widow Aurora. Bill Murray plays his constant writer friend.The filming locations in Santo Domingo are beautiful. The story is a vast family drama which Andy Garcia wants to be more like Godfather. However it never gets beyond the early promise. Garcia is mostly doing a solo gig and he's not putting enough energy into it. I don't get the Bill Murray character. The sunny Caribbean feel of the movie takes away the inherit gritty dirty feel of the story. It's too long with too much side trips. Andy Garcia's directions lack the urgency. He needs help to bring intensity into the film.

I thoroughly enjoyed this movie. The cinematography was beautiful and it was good to see a movie that doesn't romanticize Che Guevara. My only criticism is that the characters spoke in clichés throughout the movie, making the dialogue somewhat unbelievable and at times irritating.I saw other reviews criticizing the movie as propaganda and one review that oddly, complained that most of the characters were white, a bizarre complaint considering that most of the people playing the characters are actual Cuban-Americans, and not all white.As far as the criticisms of propaganda are concerned, likely this is due to the fact that the movie doesn't conform to the popular American left-wing mythology that Che Guevara was some sort of benevolent, revolutionary peasant fighting for The People and that The Wealthy are all evil, selfish, brutes, who deserved to have everything they worked for stolen and "redistributed." Nothing could be further from the truth. Che was a spoiled, upper-class, murderer and thief. The Lost City showed that (and quite frankly it only scratched the surface). Che ended up living the high life on mansions appropriated from The Wealthy. Revolutions aren't started by The People. The People are too busy working and taking care of their families. Revolutions are started by white, upper-middle class, pseudo-intellectuals, who have never dirtied their hands a day in their lives.Rent The Lost City, if you're interested in seeing another view of Cuban history outside the typical Hollywood version. However, if you don't want your entrenched view of Che and Fidel as a romantic revolutionaries to be disturbed, there's always The Motorcycle Diaries.

There needs to be a negative scale of MINUS 1 to MINUS 10 for garbage this bad... AND I WOULD RATE THIS MINUS 10 (-10)Don't waste your time unless you are a numb-skull. This movie doesn't deserve a review at all. If i could have reviewed with expletives then this review would need a xxx rating. Go watch attack of the killer tomato's or laser-blast before wasting one minute on this totally worthless piece of cinema. Regrettably some of the music is quite enjoyable however its repetitive nature and the pain of the movie robbed me of even that enjoyment. I hate myself for wasting my time and my money on hiring this movie. All copies should be sent on a Saturn five rocket out of the solar system. ... I hope this review has been clear.