Broken Embraces
Directed by: Pedro Almodovar
Written by: Pedro Almodovar
Starring: Penelope Cruz, Lluis Homar, Blanca Portillo
Written by: Pedro Almodovar
Starring: Penelope Cruz, Lluis Homar, Blanca Portillo
Pedro Almodovar is at once the subtlest and the most accessible of the great filmmakers working today. Right now he seems to be consumed with love, although not quite the love that Americans want from their films. For the last ten years he’s made films that begin with love of one sort or another and end up with something a whole lot broader, and often very different. “All About My Mother” (1999)began as a mother’s love for her dead son, but escalated into a fascinating transvestite world; “Talk To Her”(2002) was about the obsessive love a man feels for a woman he’s taking care of as she lies in a coma; “Bad Education” (2004) was about a gay love; “Volver”(2006) began as a woman protects her teenage daughter from a pedophile. And now “Broken Embraces” (2009) is about a love that takes place mostly in the past.
A middle-aged man sits with his Braille book. He’s a former movie director named Harry Caine (played by Lluis Homar), now blinded so he can only write scripts. He’s aided by his agent’s son, who’s apprenticed himself to the man in order to learn how to write scripts. But years ago he was Mateo Blanco, the director of a film called “Girls and Suitcases,” starring the gorgeous Lena (Penelope Cruz), who unfortunately happens to be the mistress of his wealthy industrialist producer (Ernesto Martel). Nevertheless the two fall in love; a dangerous thing should the producer find out.
So two elements are at work simultaneously here: the film production from 14 years before, and the present-day life of a blinded man. And we are not to feel too badly for Harry, since we see him as the film opens having just seduced a woman on the street and is now making love to her. How Almodovar works the two stories together, using one to strengthen the other, is the burden of the film. And I don’t mean burden as a heavy load; even though there are very bad things happening, there is beauty and wit enough throughout to make “Broken Embraces” a delight. And because it is about filmmaking and editing for the very best takes of each scene, and because Almodovar throws in a couple of scenes from “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown” you will find yourself giggling with recognition. And let me only say one more thing –in fact, let the world know: I am in love with Penelope Cruz. When she acts in Spanish she commands the screen as no one else today can do. Think of her work in “Vicky Christina Barcelona.” In “Volver” you simply cannot take your eyes off of her, and in “Broken Embraces” she is the essence of sexuality and enchantment. At the age of 36 she is in the very greatest flowering of her beauty; I urge you to see her at her best.
1/16/10
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A middle-aged man sits with his Braille book. He’s a former movie director named Harry Caine (played by Lluis Homar), now blinded so he can only write scripts. He’s aided by his agent’s son, who’s apprenticed himself to the man in order to learn how to write scripts. But years ago he was Mateo Blanco, the director of a film called “Girls and Suitcases,” starring the gorgeous Lena (Penelope Cruz), who unfortunately happens to be the mistress of his wealthy industrialist producer (Ernesto Martel). Nevertheless the two fall in love; a dangerous thing should the producer find out.
So two elements are at work simultaneously here: the film production from 14 years before, and the present-day life of a blinded man. And we are not to feel too badly for Harry, since we see him as the film opens having just seduced a woman on the street and is now making love to her. How Almodovar works the two stories together, using one to strengthen the other, is the burden of the film. And I don’t mean burden as a heavy load; even though there are very bad things happening, there is beauty and wit enough throughout to make “Broken Embraces” a delight. And because it is about filmmaking and editing for the very best takes of each scene, and because Almodovar throws in a couple of scenes from “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown” you will find yourself giggling with recognition. And let me only say one more thing –in fact, let the world know: I am in love with Penelope Cruz. When she acts in Spanish she commands the screen as no one else today can do. Think of her work in “Vicky Christina Barcelona.” In “Volver” you simply cannot take your eyes off of her, and in “Broken Embraces” she is the essence of sexuality and enchantment. At the age of 36 she is in the very greatest flowering of her beauty; I urge you to see her at her best.
1/16/10