''Loving Pablo'', internationally known as ''Escobar'', is a 2017 English-language Spanish

biographical A biography, or simply bio, is a detailed description of a person's life. It involves more than just basic facts like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person's experience of these life events. Unlike a profile or curric ...

crime drama film Crime film is a film belonging to the crime fiction genre. Films of this genre generally involve various aspects of crime and fiction. Stylistically, the genre may overlap and combine with many other genres, such as drama or gangster film, but al ...

directed by

Fernando León de Aranoa Fernando León de Aranoa (born 26 May 1968) is a Spanish screenwriter and film director. León de Aranoa entered the film industry as a screenwriter. He made his feature film directorial debut with '' Familia'', which won him the Goya Award fo ...

, based on Virginia Vallejo's memoir '' Loving Pablo, Hating Escobar''. It was screened out of competition in the

74th Venice International Film Festival The 74th annual Venice International Film Festival was held from 30 August to 9 September 2017, at Venice Lido in Italy. American actress Annette Bening was the jury president for the main competition. Italian actor Alessandro Borghi hosted ...

and in the Special Presentations section at the

2017 Toronto International Film Festival The 42nd annual Toronto International Film Festival was held from September 7 to 17, 2017. There were fourteen programs, with the Vanguard and City to City programs both being retired from previous years, with the total number of films down by ...

Plot

Between 1981 and 1987, Colombian drug lord

Pablo Escobar Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria (; ; 1 December 19492 December 1993) was a Colombian drug lord, narcoterrorist, and politician who was the founder and leader of the Medellín Cartel. Dubbed the "King of Cocaine", Escobar was one of the wealthie ...

had a romantic relationship with the journalist and the television presenter, Virginia Vallejo.

Cast

Javier Bardem Javier Ángel Encinas Bardem (born 1 March 1969) is a Spanish actor. In a career spanning over three decades, he has received various accolades, including an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe Award, a Critics' Choice Movie Award, tw ...

Penélope Cruz Penélope Cruz Sánchez (born 28 April 1974) is a Spanish actress. Prolific in Spanish and English-language films, she has received various accolades, including an Academy Award, BAFTA Award, a David di Donatello and three Goya Awards. Cru ...

as Virginia Vallejo *

Peter Sarsgaard John Peter Sarsgaard (; born March 7, 1971) is an American actor. He studied at the Actors Studio, before rising to prominence playing atypical and sometimes villainous roles in film and television. He made his film debut with '' Dead Man W ...

as Shepard, based on Steve Murphy *

Julieth Restrepo Julieth Restrepo (born December 19, 1986) is a Colombian model and actress. Career Restrepo began her acting career with the 2006 Colombian horror film '' At the End of the Spectra''. She has also acted in live theater. She was nominated for ...

as Maria Victoria Henao *

Óscar Jaenada Óscar Jaenada Gajo (born 4 May 1975) is a Spanish actor. He portrayed Camarón de la Isla in '' Camarón: When Flamenco Became Legend'' (2005) and Cantinflas in ''Cantinflas'' (2014). Career Óscar Jaenada was born on 4 May 1975 in Esplugue ...

as Santoro * David Valencia as Santos * David Ojalvo as

FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...

Agent * Giselle Da Silva as Olguita Arranz

Reception

Box office

''Loving Pablo'' grossed $22,017 in the United States and Canada, and $17,5 million in other territories, plus $60,312 with home video sales.

Critical response

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews and ratings of products and services, such as films, books, video games, music, software, hardware, or cars. This system then stores the reviews to be used for supporting a website where user ...

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...

, the film holds an approval rating of 31% based on 48 reviews, with a

weighted average The weighted arithmetic mean is similar to an ordinary arithmetic mean (the most common type of average), except that instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others. The ...

rating of 4.82/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "''Loving Pablo'' bungles its seemingly cinematic real-life story – and a pair of talented stars – in producing a lurid biopic that adds nothing to the Escobar subgenre." On

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, the film has a weighted average score of 42 out of 100, based on 16 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Loving Pablo 2017 films 2017 drama films 2017 biographical drama films Spanish biographical drama films English-language Spanish films Films about Pablo Escobar Cultural depictions of Pablo Escobar Films directed by Fernando León de Aranoa Films scored by Federico Jusid Films set in the 1980s Films set in Colombia 2010s English-language films 2010s Spanish films English-language biographical drama films Cocaine