Review: 'I Carry You With Me' is a tenderly realized romance that beautifully blends documentary and fiction techniques

Director Heidi Ewing’s narrative debut, “I Carry You With Me,” tells a powerful story of love and heartache, and tells it beautifully — crossing the line between narrative and documentary without ever blurring it.

Iván (Armando Espitia) is a young man living, in 1994 when this story starts, in Puebla, Mexico. He works as a prep cook in a local restaurant, but the boss won’t promote him to line cook — where he might display the skills he learned in cooking school. Iván is also gay, a fact known only to his childhood friend Sandra (Michelle Rodríguez, but not the one from the “Fast and the Furious” universe). He hides his true nature from his stern mother (Ángeles Cruz) and from his ex-wife, Paola (Michelle González), for fear she will not let him see their son.

One night, Iván meets Gerardo (Christian Vazquez), a nice guy from a rich family, and everything changes. The romance is tentative at first, as they overcome their reticence at revealing their feelings, then turns passionate and heartfelt.  

Soon, though, Iván’s drive to become a chef leads him to one choice: He aims to cross the border into the United States, and find work in a restaurant in New York. The bulk of the film depicts Iván’s journey, and Gerardo’s efforts to follow him so they can be together without the judgment of their families back in Mexico.

Ewing — who with her filmmaking partner Rachel Grady has directed such documentaries as “Jesus Camp” (2006), “Detropia” (2012) and “Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You” (2016) — depicts this romance with sumptuous images and a minimum of dialogue. Ewing and co-writer Alan Page (who wrote four episodes of “Fear the Walking Dead”) also craft several moving flashback scenes that show both men as boys, each confronted by angry fathers who think harsh discipline will keep them from being gay.

Ewing’s strongest stylistic move — which earned the film both prizes in the Next category at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival, impressing both audiences and juror Gregg Araki — is in the last half hour, when Espitia’s and Vazquez’s performances give way to documentary footage of the two men today.

The sight of Iván and Gerardo today proves out something the fictionalized Iván says early in the film: “The American dream moves in slow motion.” That may be true, but this movie doesn’t go so slowly. The audacity and generous spirit of “I Carry You With Me” will make viewers’ hearts beat in time with the story’s romantic leads.

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‘I Carry You With Me’

★★★★

Opens Friday, July 16, in select theaters. (The list of Utah theaters showing the movie is pending.) Rated R for language and brief nudity. Running time: 111 minutes; in Spanish, with subtitles.