The Secret in their Eyes shouldn't be hidden from viewers!

This past year, I helped a friend win his annual Oscar party. The winning film, he told me, was in the Foreign Film category. I found this ironic because I myself waivered on that category. It wasn’t that I had seen the films in question – I hadn’t. But I figured that the winner would be “The White Ribbon” – a film about the Holocaust. (Oscar rules dictate that Holocaust films usually win, unless going against films containing a British Queen.) At the last minute, I changed my pick to the eventual winner – Argentina’s “The Secret in their Eyes”, which was recommended by my cinematic bible, “Entertainment Weekly”.

As the next year’s Oscar race starts to heat up, I still haven’t seen “Ribbon”, but this week I sat down and watched “Eyes”. It won because it’s simply fantastic.
It’s not an easy film to describe. If pressed to describe the plot, I’d have to say that it’s about a detective who is obsessed with the murder case of a young married woman, so much so that even after he retires he tries to write a book about it. But try as he might, he just can’t get the words right. (A feeling I’m very familiar with myself.) The killer isn’t the only one that got away, though. There’s also the possible love of his life, who just happens to have been his supervisor at that time.

The story juxtaposes between what happened 25 years ago as the case develops and what happens currently. They make it easy to follow as the lead actor’s hair suddenly becomes salt-and-peppery for the current events. The filmmakers also flip between the resolution of a murder case and the resolution of a possible romance.
The supporting cast may not be filled with familiar faces, but it is filled with familiar ideas. How does one continue when the love of your life is gone? What constitutes obsession? What’s the cost of doing the “right thing”? And then there’s the one that they keep repeating throughout the film - How do you life a life full of nothing?

One of the things that I hate most about American romances is that it’s clear from the first frame how the film will end. That applies to both comedy and drama unfortunately. And for me, it’s always better if the couple in question DON’T end up together (hence why I love “Casablanca”). But as this film went on, I found myself actually caring whether these people (all of them, not just the leads) made it or not – and I don’t mean romantically.

It’s rare for me to find a film with romantic overtones that I can actually stomach. This one I recommend wholeheartedly. I’m glad that they broke the Oscar rules for this one – it’s certainly well-deserved.