Hey folks, Harry here... Wow... this sounds absolutely fantastic! The film is set to open the Cannes Film Festival this year - and it looks like that screening is going to be a huge success! Man this sounds great, of course... what else would we expect from Almodovar? Here ya go...
Hi Harry,
it's been ages since my last scoop, which was actually a review of, guess what, another Almodóvar's film "Talk to her". First I must apologize. I was obviously wrong about it, given the international praise that movie was rewarded, included the academy award for original screenplay, my review was pointless. However I still think it is one of his weakest films. Anyway, it is time to move on.
Almodóvar's new film is something completely different and remarkable. I must say I loved it, watched two times in a row and couldn't take it out of my head for days.
You may be aware of the basic plot line: two boys's friendship and early love affair in a catholic school in the sixties and the time they meet again in the eighties, each of them having changed dramatically. It is a film as hard to explain as it is easy to watch. There are many layers to the story, one of them concerning some terrible abuses one of the boys suffered by a priest, but this gets mixed up with a dramatized short story he writes many years later in order to blackmail that priest. The other boy becomes a director, and when they both meet again, he accepts to adapt his story to the screen. From then on, you can't tell apart what is real from the "movie" he is making, and also from the short story, since the facts you witness onscreen can belong to any of those "realities".
There are some revealing twists in the story I won't spoil here, but one of them drives the movie into another direction, and what is supposed to be a coming (out) of age story turn into a passionate thriller, not far in tone from films like "Double indemnity", to which the movie makes an homage.
Not unlike Hitchcock, Almodóvar uses every trick to convince us that what we see is real and he succeeds. This time Almodóvar has built what can be defined (and I'm sure this will not be the only place you read this) as a russian doll kind of movie: you open it and there's another one inside and so on. Those characters are hiding more than they are showing. This makes you completely alert during the movie, as you are suddenly changing your mind about what is happening onscreen. Sound weird? I assure you it is more enjoyable than my english is able to articulate.
The cast is remarkable, expecially Gael GarcÃa Bernal who makes a tour d'force in a specially demanding role that is really three in one. Gael's role, showy as it is, is a complete mistery that, although later on is finally reveled, you still can't decide if you stand for him or hate him. Talk to her's Javier Cámara makes a small but rich appareance as an old time travestite named Paca (a funny self-confessed homage to Farrah Fawcett, blonde wig included), and he steals the show. He is the comic relief in such an intense and feverish "film noir" that will leave you breathless.
6degrees
