TIFF 2025 | Movie Review: “Noviembre” Is A Gripping Tour de Force That Turns History Into Harrowing Theatrical Experience
11/12 ForReel Score | 4.5/5 Stars
On November 6th, 1985, a left-wing guerrilla group called Movimiento 19 de Abril (M-19, for short) stormed the Palace of Justice in Bogotá, Colombia. The intent was to hold the Justices of the Supreme Court hostage and force a trial against President Belisario Betancur. What happened instead was one of the deadliest attacks in Colombia's ongoing war with leftist rebels. Tomás Corredor's Noviembre re-enacts this event, but rather than a large-scale sweeping action film that depicts all sides, it focuses on a single microcosm of the event: several rebels holding a dozen or so hostages in a single bathroom, while the assault rages around them.
Following Natalia Reyes as Clara Helena, a rebel attempting not just to survive but to keep her compatriots alive, we bear witness to the human experience of the event. At each stage of the day, from the first moments of the assault to the military shelling of the building, Clara oscillates from conviction to terror and everything in between. Her interactions with both her squadmates and the hostages are raw and human, and utterly compelling.
Furthermore, while the single location might at first seem limiting, what it actually provides the film is pressure. Each time a fighter enters the room, either from a victory or a defeat, we feel what is happening anew. Each time someone leaves for an uncertain future, the anxiety level of the room and the audience rises, and each time the walls shake or parts of the ceiling collapse, the terror dials up significantly.
This is reinforced by the film's technical craftsmanship as well. The period details of the clothes and the room itself are impeccable, which, along with the documentary-style cinematography, help further enhance the authentic feel of the film. The sound design is where the film shines brightest. With each skirmish outside the room primarily heard rather than seen, the sounds of gunshots and yelling, either just outside the door, further away, or somewhere in between, become a key factor in ramping up tension.
When Corredor does show us anything outside of the bathroom, he does so not in reenactments but in actual archived footage from both news broadcasts and handheld cameras. It's the kind of touch that could potentially be too heavy handed, but as the footage is wordless mainly and synced up so directly to the events being portrayed inside, it only serves to amplify the tension and the empathy you end up feeling for the people inside. Special effects are great at making big explosions, but there's something more compelling and terrifying about seeing real tanks fire real shells at a building, with characters you care about inside.
As the film progresses and the day worsens, conversations about the dead, the defeated, and who knew what and when are woven into the narrative, providing not just context but also commentary on the state of the movement and the military they were fighting against. Once again, this could be ham-handed, but Corredor's screenplay has a very organic tone and naturalistic cadence which, combined with the actual events, makes each point land while also posing questions that the audience will have to answer themselves. It depicts an event that is full of complexities and nuance, but breaks said event down to its human characters, who are messy, angry, brilliant, tragic, and heartbreaking all at once.
Noviembre is an astonishing work of filmmaking, and one of the best not just of TIFF, but of the year so far.
Acting and Casting - 2 | Visual Effects and Editing - 2 | Story and Message - 2 | Entertainment Value - 2 | Music Score and Soundtrack - 1 | Reviewer's Preference - 2 | What does this mean?
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