OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE

[opinionista]

Hey,

Pedro Almodovar's new flick Volver is great. The best movie he has done so far, and Penelope Cruz's performace actually surprised me. She did very good.  It will make you cry and laugh.The movie has gotten raving reviews in Cannes Festival. Go see it as soon as it opens in your city. I highly recommend it.

[ednbarby]

Ooh, wow, cool.  I *loved* All About My Mother and Talk To Her, so to hear this is even better than those is saying a lot.  I'm looking forward to seeing it.  Hope it comes out soon, because there's nothing but summer blockbusters and crap (often the same thing) out there right now.

[opinionista]

Yes, Volver is a beautiful movie, but is also very very Spanish. It portrays the life in La Mancha (as in Don Quixote),a very rural region of Spain. I think it takes place on Almodovar's hometown, la Calzada de Calatrava. As I said it will make you laugh and cry. The music is also wonderful.

[rtprod]

Hey,

Pedro Almodovar's new flick Volver is great. The best movie he has done so far, and Penelope Cruz's performace actually surprised me. She did very good.  It will make you cry and laugh.The movie has gotten raving reviews in Cannes Festival. Go see it as soon as it opens in your city. I highly recommend it.

I can't wait to see this film but it has not screened stateside yet for US press.  I'm enamored of all his films, way back to the great ones with Carmen Maura.  Has anyone seen Law of Desire with Maura and Antonio Banderas?  That is vintage, sexy, passionate Almodovar.  Ditto Matador and Labyrinth of Passion.  Of course there are many more.  High Heels, for all its exagerrated melodrama, was affecting as well. 

Bad Education ranks with his all time best in my opinion, a snaky noir dolloped with hot, sexy imagery and some narrative tricks that are really inventive.  Gael just rocks that film, as does Fele Martinez (also great in Lovers of the Arctic Circle). 

All About My Mother may be his most emotionally accomplished film for me (something about Talk to Her left me a bit cold, oddly).  Underrated: The Flower of My Secret, starring one of his regulars, the great Spanish star Marisa Parades (now there is a world-class actress). 

God love Almodovar. 

[rtprod]

ON PENELOPE CRUZ

To sum it up, she got an unfair shake in Hollywood and certainly didn't ride the crest of Cruise the way Ms. Holmes has done.  One might guess she was too independent, unable to be molded by Mr. Hollywood (or Hollywood itself) and she wisely returned to making small and European films after her English-language features failed to ignite an American career or much audience interest.  As usual, a dependable, established and talented foreign star comes to America and our shitty movie biz fails to find a single really good role to match her -- so she ends up as the girlfriend in a series of high profile films, pegged as the "fiery" second banana to Nicolas Cage, Matt Damon, Tom Cruise and others. 

A MUST, MUST, MUST SEE and her CAREER HIGH PERFORMANCE is in a little seen recent film entitled "DON'T MOVE" -- she is so tragic and unhinged here as an immigrant Turkish maid on the skids and caught in an affair with a wealthy, adulterous doctor, and no one paid attention:

http://www.offoffoff.com/film/2005/dontmove.php

Cruz, as Italia:

[opinionista]

I can't wait to see this film but it has not screened stateside yet for US press.  I'm enamored of all his films, way back to the great ones with Carmen Maura.  Has anyone seen Law of Desire with Maura and Antonio Banderas?  That is vintage, sexy, passionate Almodovar.  Ditto Matador and Labyrinth of Passion.  Of course there are many more.  High Heels, for all its exagerrated melodrama, was affecting as well. 

Bad Education ranks with his all time best in my opinion, a snaky noir dolloped with hot, sexy imagery and some narrative tricks that are really inventive.  Gael just rocks that film, as does Fele Martinez (also great in Lovers of the Arctic Circle). 

All About My Mother may be his most emotionally accomplished film for me (something about Talk to Her left me a bit cold, oddly).  Underrated: The Flower of My Secret, starring one of his regulars, the great Spanish star Marisa Parades (now there is a world-class actress). 

God love Almodovar. 

Carmen Maura also stars in Volver. Her performance is outstanding as usual. There's another actress not so well know in the states who also does great: Lola Dueñas. She is also in The Sea Inside. I think the movie will open sometime in June in the states but I don't know for sure.

[JCinNYC2006]

I've been reading more and more about this movie, I'm excited to see it.  It's been so long since Carmen Maura was in one of Almodovar's movies.  I loved her in Law of Desire and What Have I Done To Deserve This?  But Women On The Verge of a Nervous Breakdown was to me their best collaboration.  Even if she's not the star in this one, it's cool to know they're working together again.

Juan

[starboardlight]

Has anyone seen Law of Desire with Maura and Antonio Banderas?  That is vintage, sexy, passionate Almodovar. 

yep, my first ever male/male sex scene in film. and the opening with the masturbating guy was very titillating.

but yeah, All About My Mother is the my favorite of Almodovar. I look forward to everything he does.

[rtprod]

I liked Victoria Abril so much Almodovar's High Heels and Tie Me Up, Tie Me Down (the absurd American title for Atame).  However, I despised that latter movie and thought it to be one of his weakest and a peek-a-boo waste of Abril and Banderas, though not quite as awful as Kika, which was the nadir of Almodovar's career.  

However, LIVE FLESH is another very good one starring Cruz, Francesca Neri, Javier Bardem and Liberto Rabal.  

rt

[starboardlight]

I liked Victoria Abril so much Almodovar's High Heels and Tie Me Up, Tie Me Down (the absurd American title for Atame).  However, I despised that latter movie and thought it to be one of his weakest and a peek-a-boo waste of Abril and Banderas, though not quite as awful as Kika, which was the nadir of Almodovar's career.  

However, LIVE FLESH is another very good one starring Cruz, Bardem and Liberto Rabal.  

rt

Cruz in LIVE FLESH? I had to think for a second. Yeah, she was barely in it though. Again another wonderful Almovar. The chemistry between the two men was very interesting.