VeteranLight I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

Odelecol Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

Suman Roberson It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

Adeel Hail Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

ma-cortes This is an interesting and thought-provoking drama in adequate length and yet with an air of naturalness and credibility . Including a dramatic and brooding screenplay by the same filmmaker . Hannah (Sarah Polley , Coixet wrote the role for her) is a factory worker who wears a hearing aid , she is forced to go on holiday , her first one in years . She doesn't want it and instead , Hannah arranges to find a job : caring for Josef (Tim Robbins who used contact lenses that damaged his eyes) , an injured oil rig worker who temporarily lost his sight . Hannah flies by helicopter to the oil rig (the name was Gaviota, but Coixet changed it into Genefke) . There she meets some workers , but is almost no one on the rig , except a cook (Javier Cámara) , an oceanographer and a few others . Good but downbeat and sad film in which stands out its moving finale . The film tells the touching story of two protagonists , conflicting trajectory of a hapless , introspective woman and a man whom she tends who is suffering from severe burns . She then slowly breaks her shell of silence and to be discovered a terrifying truth . This is a thought-provoking as well as pleasant flick filmed with great sensitivity and feeling . Interesting script by Isabel Coixet who wrote the role of Hannah with 'Sarah Polley' in mind , she knows very well inter-cross these two troublesome roles , a woman who have not been able to vanquish his dark past and suffering a fateful existence as well as a severely wounded rig worker . The picture is very engaging as well as provoking , though some infinite sadness follows the film at times . The flick moves in fits and starts most of which would be desirable , with some moments of enjoyment and others quite a few disconcerting . It's an intelligent and touching story although sometimes is slow moving and tiring but is finely developed with sense of style and sensibility . Enjoyable as well as intense drama filled with emotion , artistic scenes and plenty of sensitivity . The picture relies heavily on the unusual relationship among a unfortunate , frustrated nurse who has suffered a lot of past distresses and an understanding ill , but it doesn't makes boring , as it results to be entertaining . The film enjoys a breeze as well as moving final , and gives us much to think about it and in which doesn't deceive or dramatize unnecessarily . Along these lines , it is clear that writer/filmmaker Coixet tries to create an unforgettable picture . Apart from that , it has a touch Pedro Almodóvar , producer too , that always feels good . The picture is primarily supported by sensational players with good acting all around . All of them carry out their characters to perfection and show a look that says it all . As the excellent Sarah Polley as a hearing impaired who gives up her holiday and travels out to an oil rig , where she cares for a man and magnificent Tim Robbins as a burn victim on an accident . The support cast is frankly nice , such as : Reg Wilson , Steven Mackintosh , Eddie Marsan , Julie Christie , Danny Cunningham , Leonor Watling , many of them giving brief but agreeable interpretations . Special mention for Javier Cámara as a sympathetic cook . Emotive and stirring musical plenty of wonderful songs . Appropriate and evocative cinematography by Jean-Claude Larrieu . Most of the film locations are around an oil rig . Being shot on location as the oil rig used was the Borgholm Dolphin rig that was docked in Belfast at the time . Takes of the oil rig were shot in Belfast and Bilbao . Interior scenes were filmed in Navalcarnero (Madrid, Spain). The movie is dedicated the founder of IRCT -played by Julie Christie- . IRCT is an organization that promotes and supports the rehabilitation of torture victims and works for the prevention of torture worldwide . The motion picture was professional though slowly directed by Isabel Coixet . Here director Coixet mixes dull stretches with some really sensitive scenes . Coixet is an acclaimed Spanish filmmaker who has previously found international success with Elegy and The Secret Life of Words and she's the camera operator of her movies . Isabel never went to film school but she got a lot of education from commercials and really put in enough hours not to be in any way afraid of the camera . She founded her own production company , Miss Wasabi Films, in 2000 . And was member of the 'Official Competition' jury at the 59th Berlin International Film Festival in 2009 . Coixet has some fetish actresses who usually play his films , such as : Sarah Polley , Leonor Watling and Patricia Clarkson . Her filmography includes other feature films such as 'Cosas Que Nunca Dije' (Things I Never Told You) (1995), Elegy (2008), 'Mapa De Sonidos De Tokio' (Map of the Sounds of Tokyo) (2009), and the two latest 'Ayer No Termina Nunca' (Yesterday Never Ends) (2014) and 'Learning to Drive' (2013) and a thriller titled 'Another me' with Sophie Turner ; besides documentary films, shorts and commercials . And recent premiere in Berlin Festival of 'Nobody Wants the Night' (2015) starred by Juliette Binoche .

Claudio Carvalho In Ireland, the introspective deaf worker Hanna (Sarah Polley) is forced to take vacations by her boss after four years service in a factory. She travels, but when she overhears a phone conversation in a restaurant, she offers to nurse a burned worker with fractures and temporarily blind in a decommissioned oil rig. Joseph (Tim Robbins) seriously wounded after risking his life to rescue a colleague that committed suicide jumping in a fire and need to stay for a while in the platform to stabilize his health condition. Hanna is a lonely woman, with the paranoid behavior of eating white rice, chicken nuggets and apple everyday and never repeating the soap, and she slowly interacts with the few workers first, opening her heart to Joseph later and disclosing her traumatic experience in her old country."The Secret Life of Words" is a touching and heartbreaking romance, with an awesome screenplay and wonderful performances of Sarah Polley and Tim Robbins. The dramatic story develops perfectly the characters and in spite of the happy-end, it is never corny. The sensitive direction of Isabel Coixet, from the stunning "My Life Without Me" with the same Sarah Polley, is top-notch again. The process of re-socialization of Hanna, who was dead inside and reborn after meeting Joseph, is intense. My vote is eight.Title (Brazil): "A Vida Secreta das Palavras" ("The Secret Life of Words")

januce7 Isabel Coixet undoubtedly possesses a tricky sense of humor (especially lines of the leading actor) and a delicate and sensitive imagination. The dialogs are prepared so smartly and the scenes are acted so lively that it was impossible to watch the movie from the "other side". the brilliant director immediately attracts you in.there are unanswered questions left so that you can make up the answers and participate in the film yourself.the synopsis is interesting and displays the lives or jobs of people far away from our sights and make the audience try to make empathy.it is like knowing that farmers exist somewhere but never ever thinking of what would it be like...to be a farmer...Moreover the film touches pathetic social issues in a very affective way without exaggerating and agitating.The only problem was dubbing...In short it is a film to see...a complete success

marc4ucb-1 Sophie's Choice meets the English Patient w/ a Hollywood endingThe acting and dialog in this movie are first rate. But is there a "there there"? Hanna is the emotionally damaged survivor of War atrocity. She avoids any emotional and social life working only for survival in a Scottish factory. When her employer forces her to take a vacation she is forced to think about more than survival. At the last second she tries to avoid leisure time and the possibility of introspection and resurfacing emotion by volunteering to nurse for badly burned oil rig worker, Josef (Tim Robbins). Isolated on the Oil Rig with a skeleton crew she is touched by the guilt ridden and emotionally extroverted Josef. In return she confesses her own horrors. Having exposed herself she escapes from this impromptu group therapy and returns to her previous work life. Josef tracks her down with the help of Hanna's psychiatrist, Inge (Julie Christie). Julie Christie is excellent in this cameo role. Inga violates the most basic ethics of her profession to help Josef find Hanna. Hanna attempts to reject Josef because she is afraid her emotional problems will overwhelm them both. Based only on Josef's assertion that he will learn to deal with her emotional problems she relents, embrace, kiss fade out. I love the way this film is made. I love the acting. I love the dialog. In the end the resolution does not hold up. It isn't that the plot is improbable, it is simply that there is no explanation of how the events lead to the resolution.