Live Flesh

Almodovar has always been the king of kitsch, the naughty, the pervert (who isn't anyway?), the generator of endless dirty language conversations, the good the bad and the ugly of the movie world. Well, he seems to have grown mature, but not tamed in that sense. He probably will be strongly criticized for the oral sex scene, on grounds that he is abusing disabled individuals, just like he was almost damned by feminists because of the looong rape scene in Kika. Well, although he seems to have moved away from his bright colors and chaotic chasing sequences, and although Live Flesh is to the best of my knowledge the first movie where he openly praises the post-Franco era, it was as tasteful as its predecessors. And who can build up such a web of events and relations better than Almodovar does, anyway?

One of Almodovar's favourite conceits is the use of old TV and movie images as ironic commentary on our modern lives. He loves the sheer trashiness of those millions of hours of low-grade output and he likes to mimic 1950's sitcom formats ("Women On The Verge") or to splice 'quotes' from old footage into his modern tales. It's a device which he uses very effectively in this film. When the gun is fired in the apartment, a shot rings out from the TV set in the corner. The fake news item of the bus birth, in black and white to represent the drabness of Franco's Spain, is a loving recreation of TV's golden age. Women are mannequins in these old TV shows, used by men as objects of prurient displays, and of violence. Our mass media have drugged us, suggests Almodovar, into being passive recipients of authority's handouts. We can no longer distinguish between entertainment and reality. David confronts Victor and wounds him in the testicles, but the two enemies are immediately distracted by the soccer game on TV and become 'guys together', forgetting their hatred in the communal false orgasm of the scored goal.

Names are always important in Almodovar films, and in this one they hold the key to the story's many meanings. Elena is Helen of Troy, the creature who radiates unconscious sexual appeal and leads men into war and destruction. Victor Plaza's name contains several layers of symbolic importance. He is the film's real victor, overcoming the misfortune of the shooting and his own sexual imbecility to attain true happiness in America. Many Spanish towns have a 'Plaza de la Victoria', a municipal tribute to the great historical sea triumph of Lepanto. In this sense Victor's name makes him the personification of ordinary Spanish life, a hispanic Everyman. Isabel Plaza Caballero, the prostitute whose wretched short life becomes a saintly image of suffering and continuity, has the name of Spain's great Catholic queen and the title of a 'gentlewoman'. For Almodovar there is no contradiction in a whore having nobility. Sancho is a kind of Sancho Panza to David's Quixote, the latter idealistic but impotent, the former iconoclastic and comical.

Almodovar's trademark is the looping circular plot in which the characters both repeat and vary their patterns of behaviour, crossing one another's paths and inadvertently echoing the actions of others. Nowhere is this better illustrated than here. The plot is almost literally circular, beginning and ending with childbirth in a wheeled vehicle, and Victor's life-defining moment hinging on the circular bus ride which brings him back to the identical spot where he started, a payphone on the Calle Eduardo Dato. The characters penetrate one another's lives in ways that are totally convincing, and with a grounding in human psychology which few writers or directors can display.

Opposites and contradictions are everywhere. Victor is the prison convict, the sexual inadequate born of a prostitute on a bus, who rises to become an admirable man, sexually proficient, successful, and a loving husband and father. Sancho the macho cop is a spiritual cripple, relying on alcohol to deaden the pain of his failure as a lover. David the real cripple is a national sporting hero. The mother is the whore, the charity director is the heroin addict and the naive lad is the jailbird. The welcome mat on Clara's threshold is the cruellest of ironies. Marriage and sexual coupling are the fabric of the story, but in fact everyone is cuckolded sooner or later. David used to 'service' Clara, now Victor performs that function, and the 'manly' Sancho is sexually redundant. Elena copulates with Victor at the dramatic climax, and we recall that it was a sexual encounter between these two which launched the whole story.

It is hard to watch Almodovar's work without thinking of Bunuel. The adolescent preoccupation with the 'obscure object of desire' is a good example. Almodovar is fascinated by the vagina, and over and over again in this film we see men's heads buried between women's legs. Two boy children emerge from wombs, David performs oral sex on Elena in the bath, Victor studies Clara's pudendum, David approaches Elena's genitalia along his wheelchair ramp. The great sloping twin towers of Madrid's Puerta de Europa form an architectural pun, a visual representation of a woman's open thighs. Victor's emotional speech at Isabel's burial site (apart from advancing the plot neatly) is one more image of a man's face in a woman's vagina, the grave being the ultimate womb. This particular vagina brought Victor into the world, and through its immoral earnings it gave him the money to live.

The first Christmas in the film, like the First Christmas, happens in a very unpromising setting. It is cold in Madrid in every sense. The final years of Franco's joyless, oppressive reign are conveyed very effectively in a restrained palette of blacks, browns and greys. A state of emergency has been declared by a faceless Authority, grown paranoid about the danger of 'outside influences'. Victor has entered a drab and frightened world, with a bus driver as his reluctant Joseph. By the close of the film Christmas has acquired its cheerful capitalist trappings. This is a 'Christmas in the sun'. Victor is in the young land of freedom and opportunity. He has come of age and is now the complete man. The future looks bright for the New David, father and son.

Pedro Almodóvar changed the way of making cinema in Spain; and doing it, he has impressed movie watchers around the world. You have seen his movies; they are a mix of cruelty that includes honesty and passion. Not honesty in Almodovar's characters, but in the way they are written, showing a tough reality. About passion, well, it occupies a place in every person, but is not always shown; Almodóvar takes care of that.

He introduces you to the characters in the story, then he starts to develop a plot that you're going to see, even if it is predictable. Víctor (Liberto Rabal) has lost, or not, his virginity with one woman (older than him). He's not an expert when it comes to casual sex, but she wants to see this woman again, and doesn't understand why she acts like she didn't care what happened. The thing is he doesn't know she does it every week. Then we see David (Javier Bardem) and Sancho (José Sancho) working in their car. They are cops. David is honest and professional, Sancho is alcoholic and incontrollable; his wife, Clara (Ángela Molina), cheats him with another man. Sancho loves her, but beats her and keeps her locked in the house. The one who connects them all is Elena. Víctor fights with her, the police arrives, someone is shot and we see a frame that shows the movie some years later.

The person who was shot is David, who walks (well, he doesn't walk) in a wheel-chair. David saved Elena's life; they're married. Víctor is getting out of jail; he shot David. Sancho is in the same situation with his wife. Now Víctor is angry, and plans his revenge; eventually he meets Clara, and follows Elena, and everything is connected again, until the end.

Javier Bardem is excellent as David. He can cry while he talks and convince you that he is suffering. He is the finest Spanish actor, and it was wonderful to see him fighting against his character's decisions to do the things he has to.

Francesca Neri didn't seem Spanish while I was watching the film. She isn't, but she has the looks of a "femme fatally", and that was perfect for her role, which connected everything and had the strongest lines.

José Sancho gives a good support as Sancho, reaching the extremes with his face. His character is doomed, because what happens to him now is not going to stop, and the worst part is that he knows it.

Ángela Molina doesn't have the chance to shine, but still does a decent work, with what she has got. She can't be having sex with one only man, and she shows it.

Liberto Rabal doesn't show much acting talent, he's not the mos experienced in the cast, but somehow, when he talks, he seems not right, but perfect, for his role. Listen to him at the end and you'll see.

Almovodar is gifted and he proves it in each frame of this tale. You need to look at every part of the shot to see the details he is giving to the piece. Look at the sexual scenes; the balance he achieves: it's not so strong, but not soft either. It's subtle. His way of directing the actors is amazing. He writes the movie, and knows it more than anyone, so you know he is there to tell the cast what to do, and help them obtain their amazing performances. It's a visual style with life of its own.

I said it. There's cruelty and honesty at the same time. There's passion. There's betrayal, lies, sex. You see it in the characters, in their words. When David arrives home and sees his wife Elena in bed, and starts to touch her; she doesn't like it. "What's the matter?", he asks. "It hurts", Elena answers. "Why?", he says. And with a face that involves everything I'm talking about, she looks at him: "Because I've been having sex all night"

an amazing film. unpredictable, even to a film junkie and his or hers thousand films. Pedro is a true storyteller.this film withstands numerous viewings.as always, Pedro's bright color schemes make this one(too) a visual delight

Curious, seeing this after the smash hits of "Todo Sobre Mi Madre" and "Hable con Ella", because this movie sort of prepared the viewers to what was coming. Grabbing a solid and original story, Pedro Almodovar creates a movie that revolves around a strange set of characters, and on the process gives an excellent essay on the effect time has on people's lives. All the actors are top notch, specially the commanding Javier Bardem, who would later become an Oscar nominee with "Before Night Falls". Great music, cinematography and direction give this movie an even more satisfying look, and make this a well-achieved movie that ends up being the first part of an unofficial trilogy of Almodovar's best works.