Fires Within (1991) User Reviews (6)

another movie of gareta sachi .... a confused , love triangle wife.

[afterdarkpak · 6/10 · 18 February 2020]

A good movie with good ending , but this movie is slightly stupid and a bit MORALLY(in minor spoilers) wrong. Gareta sachi did many cheating wife, love triangle , confused wife movies she is perfect for such roles. another greta and vincent was real life couple at that time.

slightly morally wrong ?. a wife with daughter escaped from cuba to miami. and then she FALLS in love with fisherman and keep doing for 8 years. even knows her husband is still in prison and her daughter also likes Lover , of course a man doing a father works on mommy. so when husband came back , all seems ok ? a scene where daughter told mom that she likes mommy bf than daddy n wanna be with him ? wtf.

wife should be loyal n faithful but once there is ANOTHER man inside the wife , then the marriage is gone , no matter how hard the couple try. a scene where the wife visit lover (fisherman) to say good bye , then she said " loves him and ALWAYS love him ". and in the end , when husband announce her true feelings about wife, she suddenly start feeling good ? . ahh damn . a woman who has no control her own feelings ?.

another flaw in movie, when husband came back home , he didnt feeling or realize that she is kinda changed and a stranger keeps appearing to her n daughter and he didnt suspect anything ? wtf.

anyhow in the end. gareta sachi and vincent are good couple. in this movie. she wanna be with him but cant . and in another movie ( desire AKA salt on our skin 1992 ) she dont wanna marry him even she feels for him. funny thing is , vincent is fisherman in both movies. haha.

The impact is not quite the same back in the 1990's

[jordondave-28085 · 5/10 · 3 April 2023]

(1991) Fires Within DRAMA

A love triangle among three people, between a young Cuban woman, Isabel (Greta Schacci) who has one child, her rescuer, Sam (Vincent D'Onofrio) the skipper of the vessel he used to save her on, and her actual Cuban husband, Nestor (Jimmy Smits) who once was a political prisoner, and was had just been let go and chooses to move to Miami, Florida so that he can be closer to his wife and child after spending 8 years in solitary confinement locked in a Cuban prison. I liked this film upon watching it for the first time, but upon watching it again when i got the DVD version, the impact was not the same as I saw it back in the 1990's .

Potentially Good Film Ruined by Awful Editing

[chthon2 · 10 February 2003]

Isabel (Greta Scacchi) is a Cuban refugee who escaped with her daughter to Miami, but was forced to leave behind her husband Nestor (Jimmy Smits). Nestor was taken prisoner by Fidel Castro's communist government and has not seen his family since. Sam (Vincent D'Onofrio), a young fisherman, saves Isabel and her daughter from a raft and the two fall for each other. Years later, Nestor escapes Cuba and arrives in Miami, eager to see his former family. Not only must Isabel choose between her estranged husband and her intense, somewhat frightening American lover, Nestor is being pestered by politically motivated Cubans who want him to continue working against Castro.

The story to this film is a promising tale of torn romance. What makes it better than most is that there are too choices which must be made: Isabel's choice between mild mannered and familiar Nestor or the short tempered Sam, and Nestor's choice between his wife and his country. This is ruined, however, by choppy editing and a whole slough of unnecesary sex scenes. I'm sure the director must be saddened to see her work turned into some marginal picture about a woman who the editors turned into a mindless f***-doll.

Scacchi's performance was very real and convincing, making the poor editing all the more unfortunate. Smits, who is quite a talented actor, seems like he must have been sick or something while they were filming, because he's sort of like a zombie in this movie; no fire seems to burn within him (pun intended). D'Onofrio gives another extreme performance which is good for people like me who enjoy what critics call "over acting". Good premise, but ruined in the cutting room. Worth watching once.

slim but reasonable film

[leslieann-1 · 8/10 · 25 June 2006]

Beautiful film that is skewered not only by the distracting editing, as your previous commentator mentions, but also by the confused message...anti-Castro Cubans in the USA are numerous, but we have learned - often from the movies, like Scarface or that excellent film about a gay Cuban poet who flees Cuba - that there are many ambiguities in that life - they are simplified and reduced here too much. Isabel is very passive and perhaps traumatised to an extent that is not really illuminated. it is a terrific idea that the Cuban husband is a mild-mannered type and that the American who saved her from the sea is hot - interesting to watch; in fact, also, it is the American (d'Onofrio) who makes the point of the film, that is so under-stated and ambivalent - that the Cuban husband must choose between politics and his family. the film is interesting and exasperatingly under-stated. this could have been developed into something far more intriguing - one other good point: it is fascinating to see Hispanic Miami in all its glamour and tawdriness, however. overall, the film is really underdeveloped.

I'd have chosen Sam over Nestor any day!

[Xeresa6 · 8/10 · 21 September 2007]

I have to agree that both Greta Schacchi and Jimmy Smits were emotionally passive in this movie. Perhaps that is why Vincent D'Onofrio seemed to overpowering the other two actors since he was portraying his characters emotions with a power and intensity that the other two were lacking! I never doubted in this movie that Vincent D'Onofrio's character had fallen in love with Greta's at first sight, and it was clear that he had been the de facto father of Isabel and Nestor's daughter since she was a toddler. Sam was anxious to marry Isabel and adopt her daughter legally,but it was clear that Isabe;'s fears and cultural mores were making her ashamed of not remaining faithful to the emotional distant husband who had chosen to remain behind in Cuba rather than be with his family. Isabel and Nestor's marriage was dysfunctional as the marital scenes in Cuba show--- Nestor consistently put politics above his family and their safety! Ithink if Isabel had followed her heart and thought of her emotional needs, then she would have chosen Sam,but she let a combination of pity,duty, and the fear of gossip in the Cubam community to make the choice for her. If it had been me, I would have married Sam the first time he asked me, welcomed Nestor back, and allowed him access to his daughter, but would have made it clear that my new life was in America and I had no desire to return to either Nestor or back to Cuba! The main reason that the movie failed was that every woman left the movie thinking "What an idiot!" about Isabel's choice.

I worked on this film...

[fxmymmfxp · 10/10 · 1 March 2022]

...And I'm sorry to see the disappointed reviews here, but I'm not terribly surprised. It was originally titled Little Havana, but Robert Redford was going to release Havana, so Alan Ladd (Jr.) had our title changed-at first, to Distant Shores, which was its name all through the rest of production. It was much later I learned it was changed again to Fires Within. I've never seen the film all the way through, but I think I'll check it out now after reading these comments. FWIW, I had the time of my life on this show. Never had so much fun on any other job before or after. Everyone was wonderful, even AD Mark Edgerton, who yelled at me more than anyone ever had, and gave me a beautiful Hoffritz Swiss Army knife at the end of my time on the show. Wonderful memories for me, sorry everyone seems disappointed in the film. It goes to show you, a bad film is every bit as much work and effort as a good one.