I watched this film for a second time the other day, and realized that this may be the most perfect summation of everything that Spanish film director, Almodovar, loves and is good at. In none of his other work has the exploration of femininity, female sexuality, love, loss, and rebirth been so fully realized. In more that just content, stylistically Almodovar has successfully been able to take 1950's classic American cinema and theater, and filter it through the crazy, campy eye of a true visionary. This is as emotionally satisfying as anything that you are likely to watch, well...ever, and will necessarily challenge your conceptions of the power of family.
Cecilia Roth is sublime as Manuela, a single mother mourning the death of her seventeen year old son, who was run down by a car while chasing after his favorite actress in a production of "A Streetcar Named Desire". She moves to Madrid to find the estranged, transgender, prostitute father that her son never new, and on the way forms a surrogate family of misfits.
There is Agrado, another transgender prostitute that Manuela knew from youth and who now tries to help Manuela find a job. Hermana Rosa is an impregnated nun who spends the duration of her pregnancy in Manuela's apartment in order to hide from her family and the Father of her congregation. Finally, and most interestingly, there is Huma Rojo (Red Smoke) who was the actress playing Blanche DuBois whom Manuela's son was chasing after the night of his death. Even before I realized that it was on purpose I had the feeling that Marisa Paredes was chosen to play Huma due to her very Bette Davis-like quality.
The four of them are lonely in their own ways and cling to each other for support in times that for some of them are the most challenging of their lives, and for the others simply because they have got no one else. Interestingly enough, I think that these four women represent the different ways in which Almodovar views womankind: there is the spiritual figure, the sexual figure, the grande dame, and the guardian. In many of his other films I have gotten the sense that Almodovar hates women and much as he loves them. Not this time, though. This time it is so apparent that this is a celebration of the female form and all that she represents. Every one of his central characters has her merits which more than make up for her faults.
I think and hope that this film will be as emotionally resonate with others as it was for me. This is a movie that brims with passion, wit, and every drop of heartbreak that could ever come from a story about a parent who has to bury her child. I have not seen anything else with Cecilia Roth as far as I am aware, which is a travesty because her performance practically tore down the walls around me. This film spans months, but half a year passes and the hurt of her loss is still as strong as when it first happens. How she was able to keep the emotions so near to the surface is mysterious and spectacular.
There is a brilliant scene in which Manuela fills in for the drug-addicted actress playing Stella. Having seen the show endless times following the death of her son, and having heard the lines nightly while working as the personal assistant for Huma, she plays the part perfectly. Almodovar creates the scene in which Stella goes into labor and Stanley carries her off. The cries she gives begin as cries of pain which become cries of grief. Even during a performance all of her anguish bursts out and hits the theater audience as well as the film audience at full force and it is incredible.
There is something very magical that comes out of the head of the writer/director in this particular film. There are things that go on that I feel Almodovar has wanted to say in the past, but I don't think that he liked his characters in other work nearly as much as he does in this one. Although it is a sad piece--a very sad piece--it still teams with life, and it is very clear that his message is not about dwelling on painful memories, but is about rejoicing that we live in a world of vivacity and interesting people with new ones being born all of the time. Where God closes a door, somewhere He opens a window, as they say. Had her son not died--which I still wish he hadn't as it would have saved me a good deal of crying--Manuela would not have been able to help those that she did, and would not have been given the miracle of rebirth that she was in the end, and that is a hopeful thought.
4/4
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