Before I get to the film, I'd love to know who on earth translates the titles of South American films into English! We had the disaster of Los Fuertes being translated as The Strong Ones when a competent translation would have been something like The Tough Guys except that the title actually referred to the forts taken by Chilean nationalists in the battle for independence. And here we have The Blond One. It just doesn't work in English. Why not Some Blond Lad/Guy/Fella? Because, at first, that's all Gabriel seemed to be for Juan, some guy. Or even "The Blond Guy"? The title is taken from a line of dialogue in a section when Juan is asked who is going to move in and he says, "The blond one" in the translated subtitles. I think that this is a bad translation. This would normally have been translated as "The blond guy".

After moving in with Juan as a lodger, Gabriel notices that Juan seems to be coming onto him despite his clear hettie proclivities and oikish straight mates. It takes nearly a third of the film before Gabriel gives in and the scene is sensitively and erotically done in the faltering first touches.

They are a couple of handsome lads with good bodies and more importantly, for the development of the plot, straight acting. No one suspects either of them would be up for swinging both ways - Juan has girlfriends coming round and Gabriel is a father. That's the way Juan wants to keep it.

As their relationship deepens it becomes clear that they are looking for different things. One wants stability and fidelity, the other wishes to keep up appearances and to sow wild oats in either direction. There are some pretty hurtful scenes where Gabriel has to keep stum about his feelings.

A few people have commented that the film is long and empty. For me it wasn't. The two leads filled the spaces by body language and looks. We don't have to have dialogue every second. These two guys did a great job of conveying emotion and feelings by suggestion.

The trainline linking the two guys' lives, work, offspring, other lover and friends was a recurring and unifying theme in the story often showing or being mentioned at significant occasions in the plot.

The guys get the futures they wanted - or were destined for - in the end. I found the ending liberating, especially in terms of being gay. I disagree with those who think the ending is pessimistic.

At an hour and fifty minutes, this evocative, languid film was just right.

I missed this feeling while watching a film, That emotional tender you feel in your stomach at the end of a movie. Really beautiful and touching film. it's a plaintive story filled with melancholy its heartening and gladdening moments. This film, which unlike movies like Call me by your name rather than romanticizing love between two men it takes a realistic more relatable approach to it, with the same emotional density. This film is relatable because it portrays how a relationship between two guys from the middle class is, which isn't an easy or a forward situation, it demonstrates how subtle and on guard, the seduction is through perfect and stunning body language that filled the void when the dialogue was absent (acting is perfect),and made us feel how unsettled their couple is, far from the Hollywood mainstream gay or the big cities. As Juan expresses it at some point in the movie " I want a normal life, I don want to be pointed at" so there's this secret and discreet love due to fear of being exposed even if the two live together as roommates. on the other hand, Gabriel is the most interesting character, he has a girl and always seems to keep up with Juan's Duality, his eyes are full of melancholy and tiredness yet his face is comforting and ingenious and he's the most secure. He looks like the guy who's ready to take risks as he keeps up and try to ignore Juan's misadventures with his girlfriend until the point where Juan makes his choice which leaves the two devastated but while Juan is showed on the verge of tear staring at the void after he chooses to settle with his GF, Gab ends up quitting his job, starting over and opening up to his young girl in a stirring and heart-warming scene. A moment that shows a well-deserved resolution for a pure character.

Juan and Gabriel (Alfonso Baron and Gastón Re) are co-workers in a lumberyard. Gabriel rents a room to the first in his suburban apartment, initiating a coexistence and the development of a changing bond.

This time Berger exceeds his own limits: tension emerges in the development of a possible love story based on two very different characters in terms of what they are willing to put into play, the relationship with their surroundings and their personality, from the hand of an intense chemistry between Barón and Re and of a camera that exposes them without modesty, lovingly and with an exquisite photograph. Excellent performances by Baron and a very expressive Re, capable of giving his Gabriel many nuances almost without speaking.

The Blond One exhibits a very clever script that poses this link as a crossroads of the vital paths in mirror and in opposite directions that both protagonists carry out and that culminates with a certainly epiphanic coda.