--- title: "Che: Part Two: the reviews" canonical: "https://film.one/film/che-part-two/reviews" title_page: "https://film.one/film/che-part-two" critics_score: 74 critics_reviews: 7 licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Che: Part Two (2008): what the critics said Critics' score 74 from 7 reviews: 4 positive, 3 mixed, 0 negative. Most critics agree on what Che: Part Two is doing and split on whether it is worth the effort. The praise clusters around Benicio del Toro, whose quiet, unshowy performance is singled out again and again, and around Soderbergh’s refusal of biopic habits: no psychology, no speeches, just the daily grind of a failing campaign reconstructed with unusual care. The reservations cluster just as tightly. A large share of the reviews find the film emotionally flat, the marches tedious and the skirmishes hard to tell apart, and several say the fastidiousness leeches the drama out of the story. The spread is moderate rather than wide; nobody dismisses it, but a good number stop short of recommending it. Variety, writing from the festival, is the harshest, arguing neither half stands alone and the whole offers more aggravation than reward. The Guardian and The Skinny take the opposite view, finding Part Two the more coherent and affecting of the pair. ## The AV Club — Keith Phipps Rating A-. 12 December 2008. Soderbergh emphasizes observation over ideology with an eye toward the mundane details of life on the front lines of a revolution, building to a thrilling climax in the first half and a kind of grace in the second. The film renders Guevara as an undemonstratively magnetic figure driven by his convictions. [Read the review](https://www.avclub.com/che-1798205373) ## Empire — Andrew Male Fi1m's normalised score 80/100 (inferred from the text). 29 January 2009. The critic views the film as a grim, melancholic depiction of Guevara's failed Bolivian campaign, marked by hunger and defeat. They single out Benicio Del Toro's quiet and magisterial performance for praise, especially in a tense persuasion scene. [Read the review](https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/che-part-two-review/) ## Time Out — David Jenkins Rating 4/5. 17 February 2009. Part Two stands alone effectively as Soderbergh's study of Che Guevara's failed 1966 Bolivian campaign. It highlights the director's focus on the realities of revolutionary struggle and Benicio del Toro's restrained performance, while noting that the film's academic tone and emphasis on source material details can sometimes hinder dramatic flow. [Read the review](https://www.timeout.com/movies/che-part-two) ## Slant Magazine Rating 2.5/4. 26 September 2008. Soderbergh’s professed neutrality toward Guevara’s life and times succeeds mostly in leeching the emotion out of them, resulting in a work of intelligent fastidiousness rather than vivid inspiration. Part Two traces the leader’s ultimately doomed attempt to bring the revolution to the rest of Latin America as a death march. [Read the review](https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/che/) ## Los Angeles Times — Sheri Linden 12 December 2008. The film rebels against biopic conventions by focusing on the rigors and specifics of armed struggle rather than psychological drama. It is an extraordinary, challenging work that favors action and strategy over emotional aha moments. [Read the review](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2008-dec-12-et-che12-story.html) ## The Guardian — Peter Bradshaw 20 February 2009. The second part works better on its own as a coherent, mysterious evocation of Che's final doomed campaign in Bolivia. Soderbergh's austere, experimental approach shows only the outer man and avoids conventional character insight or cliché. [Read the review](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2009/feb/20/film-review-che-part-two-steven-soderbergh-benicio-del-toro) ## The Hollywood Reporter 21 May 2008. Festival review. The two-part biopic is a highly worthwhile, professionally accomplished project that informs viewers but in its obsessive devotion to precise documentation forgets to inspire. Part Two, focusing on the failed Bolivian uprising, is all down, down, down and seems to go on forever with indistinguishable skirmishes. [Read the review](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-reviews/che-film-review-126170/) ## The New Yorker — Anthony Lane 11 January 2009. Soderbergh's two-part film is a scrupulous but emotionally flat procedural on guerrilla warfare that avoids hagiography and shows the shift from dream to disillusion. It is marked by precise detail yet lacks dramatic impact or deep insight into its subject's passions. [Read the review](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/01/19/ches-way) ## The New York Times — A.O. Scott 12 December 2008. The film is an epic but ultimately evasive portrait that prioritizes formal sophistication and factual detail over moral reckoning with its subject. It excels as a master class in filmmaking technique while falling short as history. [Read the review](https://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/12/movies/12che.html) ## The Times — Edward Porter 22 February 2009. The film reconstructs Che's failed Bolivian campaign with impressive persuasiveness and observes him nobly leading his men, but it lacks tension or clear sense of what Soderbergh aimed to achieve. [Read the review](https://www.thetimes.com/culture/tv-radio/article/che-part-two-2v0fqq25rbn) ## Variety — Todd McCarthy 22 May 2008. Festival review. Soderbergh's ambitious four-hour presentation of Che's life is defiantly nondramatic, with part two feeling like a military training documentary that lacks excitement. Neither half stands alone satisfyingly, and the whole offers more aggravations than rewards. [Read the review](https://variety.com/2008/film/awards/che-2-1117937244/) ## Eye for Film — Chris Fi1m's normalised score 70/100 (inferred from the text). 2 January 2009. The critic views it as a commendable achievement in documenting history with integrity, though it lacks dramatic tension and may disappoint those seeking entertainment. They single out the authentic mise-en-scene and Benicio Del Toro's portrayal of a tragic hero for praise. [Read the review](https://www.eyeforfilm.co.uk/review/che-guerilla-film-review-by-chris) ## Paste — Jesse Jarnow Fi1m's normalised score 65/100 (inferred from the text). 30 January 2009. Soderbergh and Del Toro treat Che’s life as a realist epic in this audacious four-hour-plus film focused on guerrilla struggles. The marches across Cuba and through Bolivia’s jungles are deeply tedious, but Guevara’s unbendable will centers the two missions—one ascendant, one disastrous—and Soderbergh is ultimately victorious. [Read the review](https://www.pastemagazine.com/movies/che-the-argentine-guerrilla) ## Digital Spy — Simon Reynolds Fi1m's normalised score 60/100 (inferred from the text). 16 February 2009. The critic finds Che Part 2 an uncompromised but dragging work that excels in authenticity and Del Toro's performance depicting Guevara's downfall, though it lacks human depth and moves too slowly. [Read the review](https://www.digitalspy.com/movies/a146429/che-part-2/) ## The Skinny — Keir Roper-Caldbeck Rating ****. 4 February 2009. Praises Part 2 for its intimacy and tragic portrayal of Che's doomed Bolivian revolution, contrasting it with the more ponderous Part 1. [Read the review](https://www.theskinny.co.uk/film/new-releases/che-parts-one-and-two) --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Our review: https://film.one/film/che-part-two.md