During a lull in receipt of new movies at my local public library I found the BluRay of this movie on the shelves, begging for a viewing. I have found almost any recent movie on BluRay is worth seeing for the glorious picture and sound. This one fits the bill.
It is set and 'filmed' digitally in beautiful Argentina, mostly in relatively high contrast B&W, with flashback scenes in full color. It works very well and looking back at my viewing experience I enjoyed the cinematography even more than the story.
Yet the story is good, generally around old and new family dynamics. Set in early 2008, mid-40s Vincent Gallo is 40-ish Angelo Tetrocini, son of a famous musical conductor. He was a promising writer but left his American home and went off to Argentina where he no longer wrote. He doesn't want any connection to his family and has dropped his real name and goes only by 'Tetro'.
If you look up the definition of 'tetro' you get " gloomy, sullen bleak, dismal, grim " and that pretty well characterizes Tetro.
His younger brother is Alden Ehrenreich, about 18, as Bennie, about to turn 18. He has a job as a waiter on a cruise liner that has engine problems so he has a few days to look up Angie, his brother. But Tetro is not happy to see him, he makes that clear, but his wife urges Bennie to stay with them for the few days.
Bennie discovers Tetro's unfinished manuscripts, which also infuriated Tetro when he found out. But they being all "unfinished" Bennie was determined to write an ending. he turned it into a stage play which became a contender at the May 2008 Patagonia festival.
The movie is seldom fun to watch, well maybe the scene where Bennie, just having turned 18, is in a bathtub with two attractive young ladies. But it is a gripping drama and Gallo is ideal for the role.
SPOILERS: The family dynamics were even more serious than we first knew, Bennis is not Tetro's brother, he is actually his son from a brief love affair when Tetro was 20. I'm still not sure why Tetro was rejecting even his own son but in the end it seems that there would be redemption for all.
It is set and 'filmed' digitally in beautiful Argentina, mostly in relatively high contrast B&W, with flashback scenes in full color. It works very well and looking back at my viewing experience I enjoyed the cinematography even more than the story.
Yet the story is good, generally around old and new family dynamics. Set in early 2008, mid-40s Vincent Gallo is 40-ish Angelo Tetrocini, son of a famous musical conductor. He was a promising writer but left his American home and went off to Argentina where he no longer wrote. He doesn't want any connection to his family and has dropped his real name and goes only by 'Tetro'.
If you look up the definition of 'tetro' you get " gloomy, sullen bleak, dismal, grim " and that pretty well characterizes Tetro.
His younger brother is Alden Ehrenreich, about 18, as Bennie, about to turn 18. He has a job as a waiter on a cruise liner that has engine problems so he has a few days to look up Angie, his brother. But Tetro is not happy to see him, he makes that clear, but his wife urges Bennie to stay with them for the few days.
Bennie discovers Tetro's unfinished manuscripts, which also infuriated Tetro when he found out. But they being all "unfinished" Bennie was determined to write an ending. he turned it into a stage play which became a contender at the May 2008 Patagonia festival.
The movie is seldom fun to watch, well maybe the scene where Bennie, just having turned 18, is in a bathtub with two attractive young ladies. But it is a gripping drama and Gallo is ideal for the role.
SPOILERS: The family dynamics were even more serious than we first knew, Bennis is not Tetro's brother, he is actually his son from a brief love affair when Tetro was 20. I'm still not sure why Tetro was rejecting even his own son but in the end it seems that there would be redemption for all.