SummaryIn January 2009, Oliver Stone travelled to Venezuela to interview President Hugo Chavez, and examine the way Chavez has been portrayed in the U.S. media. Was Chavez really the “anti-American” force the media claimed he was? Once the journey began, however, Stone and his crew found themselves going beyond Venezuela to several other countries, and ... Read More
Directed By:Oliver Stone
Written By:Mark Weisbrot, Tariq Ali
South of the Border
Metascore
Mixed or Average
45
User score
Generally Favorable
6.1
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Top Cast
Metascore
Mixed or Average
45
26% Positive
5 Reviews
5 Reviews
53% Mixed
10 Reviews
10 Reviews
21% Negative
4 Reviews
4 Reviews
83
Yes, Stone gets cozy with Hugo Chávez, soft-pedaling the Venezuelan president's crackdown tendencies, but he also captures South America in a paradigm shift, wrenching itself free of centuries of colonial control. The film is rose-colored agitprop, but it catches a current of history.
75
But to be fair, Stone doesn't seem even to think he's offering the last word here. Rather, he's trying to offer the first word, or at least a first opportunity to hear the other side, unfiltered by television media.
60
The aural and visual overload that marks most of the director's work is here in spades--few documentaries look and sound so distinctive.
50
Three minutes into the film, we feel the sharpness of Stone's ax to grind. It's dull to be told what to think.
40
Stone embarrasses himself by backing the wrong horse and then making a weak case for him.
30
The 70-minute movie -- which was co-written by the British-Pakistani commentator Tariq Ali, author of the 2006 study "Pirates of the Caribbean: Axis of Hope," and photographed in part by docu-doyen Albert Maysles -- is amateur night as cinema, as lopsided and cheerleadery as its worldview.
0
South of the Border's subjects are masters at cooking bullshit, and Stone just eats it up.
User score
Generally Favorable
6.1
56% Positive
5 Ratings
5 Ratings
22% Mixed
2 Ratings
2 Ratings
22% Negative
2 Ratings
2 Ratings
Sep 5, 2010
10
The flack that critics have aimed at this film is completely unjustified. The focus of the film is on countering years of blatant "big lie" propaganda aimed at Chavez and other Latin American nationalist leaders who have broken from U.S. domination. And the film makes its case regarding that propaganda onslaught very precisely and strongly, completely debunking it by using clips from U.S. news media and then countering with interviews and facts. The attack of the critics on this film is just one more example of that mendacious campaign, and if you miss this film because of it then you will yourself have become a victim of the U.S. media's propaganda. See this film and decide for yourself!
