Daniel Hendler. They are largely autobiographical, dealing with the life of a young Jew in contemporary Buenos Aires. Title The name of the film in Spanish is an intentional pun: abrazo means "embrace" and does not make sense followed by partido "broken" or "gone," but the idiom a brazo partido, literally "with a broken arm," means "to fight forcefully, strenuously." It could also be understood as "the halved hug," that is, an incompleted hug or made with just one arm. Distribution The film was first featured at the Berlin International Film Festival on February 9, 2004. It opened in Argentina on March 25, 2004. The film screened in many film festivals, including: the Helsinki International Film Festival, Finland; the Warsaw Film Festival, Poland; the Pusan International Film Festival, South Korea; the Chicago International Film Festival, United States; the Bangkok World Film Festival, Thailand; the São Paulo International Film Festival, Brazil; the London Film Festival, UK; and others. The film was released in Argentina on VHS and DVD by Argentina Video Home under license from Distribution Company on July 3, 2004; with English, Portuguese and Spanish subtitles and extras. It was re-issued on DVD by SBP on March 13, 2013, with the same specifications besides the removal of Portuguese subtitles. Critical reception Lost Embrace garnered mostly positive reviews from film critics. On review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an overall 83% "Certified Fresh" approval rating based on 48 reviews, with a rating average of 6.7 out of 10. The site's consensus is: "A low-key but charming tale that will put a smile on your face." At Metacritic, which assigns a weighted mean rating out of 0–100 reviews from film critics, the film has a rating score of 70 based on 23 reviews, classified as a generally favorably reviewed film. Film critic A.O. Scott, film critic for The New York Times, liked the direction of the film, writing, "Lost Embrace never feels strenuous or overdone. The tenderness of the family drama at its center, and the deep, hard-to-articulate feelings of a son for his enigmatic father and his heroically patient mother, emerge with a charming haphazardness. The sly artfulness is apparent only in retrospect. This is a small movie about a small world, but its modesty is part of what makes it durable and satisfying." Kenneth Turan, film critic for the Los Angeles Times, liked the films direction and wrote,