'A Poet' review: a tragicomic Colombian tale about a failing writer

Alissa Wilkinson reviews "A Poet," a film directed by Simón Mesa Soto and set in Medellín. The New York Times critic published the review on Jan. 29, 2026, and selected the film as a Critic’s Pick. The film follows Oscar Restrepo (Ubeimar Rios), a once-promising poet who published two books and won prizes in his youth but is now middle-aged, unemployed and living with his mother (Margarita Soto).

Oscar is given to drinking binges, wears ill-fitting clothes, and repeatedly reads his old poems until they grow threadbare to those around him; his teenage daughter (Alisson Correa) regards him with pity. Soto skewers the devotion to the creative life that exists without much creating and broadens the story to show when artists fail one another.

Oscar’s old friend Efrain (Guillermo Cardona) is a more successful, pompous poet who tells Oscar, "You might achieve recognition after death, but first you’d have to have written a great poem." Efrain gets Oscar a reading and an awkward TV appearance — seated beside a man who wrote a viral song called "Wet My Jacuzzi" — and helps Oscar land a high-school teaching job where Oscar discovers Yurlady (Rebeca Andrade), a teenager who scribbles poetry in a sparkly notebook.

The film traces the pressure to shape work for the marketplace: Efrain urges Yurlady to write about being poor or experiencing prejudice, while she wants to write about light in her bedroom.

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