Alike (2015) User Reviews

Great lesson, sleek visuals

[Imdbidia · 7/10 · 26 January 2017]

Alike is a visually yummy short: smooth, elegant and minimalist, with a great composition and framing, and a selective use of color (a mix of beige, gray and blue toned down hues alternated with dark browns and some bright colors). Alike is not about the visuals, though, is about the message conveyed via an apparently simple story of a father and a son who are anything but alike.

The story is about the way we teach our children, which values and ways of being we force upon them, and how sometimes that is not always good for them. It is a story about not cutting the creative wings of any person as those are innate and cannot be eliminated, just repressed. It is also a story about learning from what makes children happy, as if they are happy we are, too. Alike is mostly, a short about how creativity brights our souls and brings joy to our lives.

No words are used, but the story is well told and are not missed.

Perhaps the thing I liked the least was the facial expression of the child character in the story and some of the intended jokes.

A lovely short film.

Excellent

[djrrd · 10/10 · 20 March 2017]

I saw Alike as part of a festival short animated films and was blown away by it. I'd taken my 2 x kids and thoroughly enjoyed all the films but this one in particular really struck a chord with me. No spoilers - I thought the story was great, it was clever, brilliantly done and really touching as well......I had a wee tear in my eye at the end.

I'd definitely recommend you see this as it's brilliant.

Minimalist

[Hitchcoc · 9/10 · 3 April 2019]

I love the expressions of the little boy. He is full of hope and creativity and is cut off at the pass each time he expresses himself. His father is a worker. He goes in at the same time and comes home at the same time each day. He frowns at his son's childishness in the face of prescriptive learning. He pulls him away from experiences that he sees as trivial. A lot is said in a short period of time here.

Contradictory instead of convincing

[Horst_In_Translation · 4/10 · 18 February 2017]

"Alike" is a Spanish 8-minute (7 without credits) short film from 2015. It was written and directed by Rafa Cano Méndez and Daniel Martínez Lara. It says here on IMDb that the language is Spanish, but there is no dialogue in here at all, so you can check this one out no matter where you are from and what languages you (don't) speak. But why would you? I would really only recommend this one to the very biggest animation lovers. Or maybe these are the ones who will dislike this film the most. I personally did not really enjoy the simplistic style of this film. Of course, it is an approach you can give, but somehow the entire film felt very cold and the cold uninspired world and background characters are not enough of an explanation. This one certainly could have needed more love to detail and this applies also to the two central characters in my opinion, father and son. The story was a bit predictable and the happy ending feels forced with the adult character's action appearing very random instead of convincing, let alone smart or touching. Another problem: The (lack of) color is used by the filmmakers here to describe the duo's emotional states. But it is never really obvious what the colors stand for, or the absence thereof. Joy? Happiness? Creativity? You can make an argument for all of these, but you can also make an argument against these. I actually liked the film's idea that schools suck creativity out of actually talented children, but then I realizes that this was not the filmmaker's intention at all. I am a bit surprised this one received a solid deal of awards recognition as I would not call it a memorable watch at all. Thumbs down.