People are voting emotionally.

Must See Movie...

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

A day in the life of an immigrant living in New York City. Luciana (Ana Asensio) works multiple dead-end jobs but still can't seem to make ends meet. Desperate for money, she agrees to work a party, despite not knowing anything about it besides the fact that she will receive $2000 when she's done.Very slow paced movie. It's not boring, just slow. And the ending is a bit on the strange side. If it's raining or snowing and you need to pass time, watch it. Being a guy, the nudity helps :)

Take a bow, Ana Asensio. The Writer-Director-Actor of 'Most Beautiful Island', a film that's likely to surprise and shake you way more than you could imagine. This dazzler is a strong film, that shuns "The Great American Dream' with ferocity. 'Most Beautiful Island' Synopsis: An illegal immigrant (Ana Asensio) struggling to begin a new life in New York City is offered a great opportunity, but as day turns to night, she discovers she's been lured into a dangerous game.'Most Beautiful Island' follows a woman's struggle in the big apple. She babysits children to survive, sells fried chicken dressed up as a chicken to lure NYC's ruthlessly busy crowd. However, things get worse when she volunteers to attend a 'party'. What happens at this 'party' is something to be witnessed and experienced. The only way I could describe the film's final act would be in one word: Spellbinding. Asensio's Screenplay shows struggle & desperation with excellence. You feel for Luciana, the protagonist, as she hustles & bustles the madness of America's most ambitious city. Asensio's Writing depicts the ugliest side of "The Great American Dream". Asensio's Direction is powerful, too. She has handled this intense story, with command. Cinematography & Editing, merit a special mention.Performance-Wise: Its Asensio all the way. The actress delivers a knockout performance from start to end. She takes to the part like a fish takes to water. Its a fully committed, fleshed out performance from an actress we had no clue was all set to surprise us. The rest of the cast lends remarkable support.On the whole, 'Most Beautiful Island' is among the year's strongest films. Don't miss it.

There isn't really much to this film or at least there isn't for the nearly the first 45 minutes. Its unfortunate because its after this time the real story begins which is decidedly more interesting and entertaining that what precedes it. Even so, its not enough to redeem the film.The first 45 minutes really details the difficulties our lead faces as an immigrant in NY. The story goes into some considerable and unnecessary detail with her situation and because there is little dialogue or interaction with her on this front we don't really get any emotional investment in her character. Mostly your left watching a series of boring on screen events. You observe the problems she faces due to a lack of finances while wondering when something significant is going to happen. There is also little or no musical accompaniment so you have only tedious screenplay to clue you in and absorb you into her situation.The pace of the film is very slow throughout. Scenes are very elongated so you end up with very long periods where little happens, or it happens in the midst of a long sequence of trivial events that really add nothing to the proceedings. Most of the content in this film would have ended up (quite rightly) on the cutting room floor of any Hollywood production, but in truth there isn't a lot of material here to begin with. Realistically without the padding this film would really only be 20-30 minutes long.There is little character or plot development and no real story progression. The underlying plot is a good one but hasn't had the development necessary to produce anything substantial. I think the main issue with this movie is the majority of it exists solely as a segue to the final section where the real story lies. Unfortunately this final section is thin, premature and lacking enough material to thicken out the story. What left is tale worthy of little more than a film short. The lead is quite good and does well with the material. There are no major roles here so other than the lead most other parts are fairly trivial; but they're handled reasonably well considering as was the direction. Its clearly a small production, probably without the resources larger films have to plug holes and address shortcomings, but I think the writing/producing is lacking. The story is mostly filler and that doesn't bode well for keeping you focused as you yawn and drift off in places.If you have idle time, watch it but I would advise against putting time aside to see it, it's just not worth it.

Most Beautiful Island was extremely well-received at Austin's SXSW Film Festival where it won Grand Jury Award for Narrative Feature. This eloquent film explores the experiences of Luciana, a recent undocumented immigrant, who has recently arrived from her home land and is just trying to get by in New York. The film focuses on a single day as she takes various odd jobs and then gets invited to work at a mysterious party where she will be extremely well-paid for a single night's work. The suspense builds towards a truly shocking and deeply disturbing climax. This film shows the truly dark side of the American Dream and the truly disturbing nature of class privilege in a society with huge gaps in class and, therefore, power and privilege. The story is described as inspired by true events so there may be some exaggeration in the actual climax, but it is still quite powerful and leaves the audience awestruck. Ana Asensio directed, wrote and stars in this fascinating and absorbing film. It is beautiful written, filmed and acted. The tension builds towards the disturbing climax. The American Dream is not always what it seems to be and needs to be re-imagined for our current economic and political realities. I hope the film gets distributed so more people can learn to empathize with the immigrant experience which has sadly become a political punching bag in recent years.