This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

romanticism. and cooking. and the Latino America air like embroidery of flavors, magic, beautiful images, noble feelings and profound dramas. a refuge in the inn of a fantastic world at the borders between fairy tale and reality, remembering Garcia Marquez and the seduction force of cinema. a love story and a family story. and the taste of dishes and the solitude of a young woman front to her duty and the answers to the strong, silent questions. a film like a travel. in a mythical time more than in a literary space. because all is so simple. and full of admirable definition of life, love and references to a version of Cinderella.

This movie is about how life used to be in Mexico. It is a love story between Pedro and Tita, and why they couldn't get married because Tita's mother wanted her oldest daughter to get married first, and have Tita to stay and take care of her. It shows how marriage was imposed on those times, and how a love between two people can change everything.This is supposed to be a great film, but for me it just did not resonate. I appreciate the movie to a point, and it is good to see a film from Mexico (the country needs a bigger industry, perhaps). Most of all, I love that apparently Robert Rodriguez hung around the set before becoming an A-list director for Hollywood.But overall, this is not one that really had any impact on me whatsoever, so I can only give it a middling grade.

Engaging drama.Set in Mexico in the early-1900s, the story of a girl and her oppressive, tyrannical mother. In her teens, the girl falls in love with a boy and they want to get married. The mother is determined that the girl will never marry, as she has to look after her. Drama and intrigue follows...Initially a very suffocating movie, as you feel how the girl is oppressed and deprived of her free will by her evil mother. You keep hoping that she will run away, or do something to break free.Then follows a spell of liberty, and probably the most wonderful part of the movie. The shackles have been removed and she can now be herself and follow her dreams and loves.However, just when you thought that was the precursor to a happy ending, the movie loses focus. It suddenly gets quite weird, complete with ghosts, and ultimately becomes a soap opera. The last few scenes are pure soap, and diminish the value of what came before them.Overall - good, but could have been brilliant.

Though I thoroughly enjoyed the novel, Like Water for Chocolate, I thought that the movie was extremely disappointing and reminded me of really terrible and overly-dramatic soap operas. The portrayal of the use of magical realism very realistically in the movie really took away from the experience of watching it. The addition of music could have made or broken this movie, and in this case, I believe it made dramatic and heart- wrenching moments from the book seem laughable. The dramatization of cooking in the movie seemed to be a mindless chore, unrelated to the plot, very much in contrast to the emotional release experienced by Tita while cooking in the novel. I was also quite unable to relate to any of the characters as they were portrayed in the film. They all appeared, to me, very one-sided and unoriginal. The depiction of the Mexican Revolution disgusted me, and should have been taken far more seriously, in my opinion. Laura Esquivel should probably stick to writing novels, not screenplays.