Review: A poet on the run in startlingly great ‘Neruda’
Chilean director Pablo Larrain is on a hero’s quest to destroy the conventional biopic it seems. He turned the post-assassination days of Jacqueline Kennedy into an atmospheric examination of mythmaking and the public and private self in “Jackie,” and in “Neruda ,” the story of a poet on the run, into a thrilling meditation on authorship.
The stories of both Jackie Kennedy and Pablo Neruda are already compelling on their own, but Larrain manages to go beyond the specifics and get to their essence through powerfully and uniquely cinematic storytelling.