Before Night Falls

...en inträngande skildring av en outsiders liv.

While this is complex material, spanning a defiant artist's lifelong compulsion to express himself and suffer harrowing consequences, it's thoroughly involving and beautifully realised.

Schnabel, the painter, makes his screen a rich canvas of dream sequences, fragmented childhood memories, and the wild Cuban demimonde inhabited by Arenas and others who do not conform.

...Bardem's hugely expressive face gives aching voice at times to the pain, as well as the joy, that Arenas suffers as he goes through abuse, imprisonment and ultimately AIDS. He's something special.

The film has the grainy look of sun-bleached color snapshots, and is peppered with great cameos...