Author Topic: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE  (Read 8735 times)

Offline opinionista

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OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« on: May 19, 2006, 09:23:37 am »
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.
« Last Edit: May 19, 2006, 11:34:36 am by opinionista »
Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement. -Mark Twain.

Offline ednbarby

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie
« Reply #1 on: May 19, 2006, 10:29:14 am »
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.
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Offline opinionista

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie
« Reply #2 on: May 19, 2006, 11:33:29 am »
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.
Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement. -Mark Twain.

rtprod

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #3 on: May 19, 2006, 11:46:10 am »
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

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #4 on: May 19, 2006, 11:51:37 am »
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:
« Last Edit: May 19, 2006, 12:18:42 pm by rtprod »

Offline opinionista

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #5 on: May 19, 2006, 12:23:14 pm »
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.
Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement. -Mark Twain.

Offline JCinNYC2006

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #6 on: May 19, 2006, 12:55:05 pm »
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
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Offline starboardlight

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #7 on: May 19, 2006, 12:59:59 pm »
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.
"To do is to be." Socrates. - "To be is to do." Plato. - "Do be do be do" Sinatra.

rtprod

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #8 on: May 19, 2006, 01:01:48 pm »
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
« Last Edit: May 19, 2006, 01:04:55 pm by rtprod »

Offline starboardlight

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #9 on: May 19, 2006, 01:04:27 pm »
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.
"To do is to be." Socrates. - "To be is to do." Plato. - "Do be do be do" Sinatra.

Offline opinionista

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #10 on: May 19, 2006, 01:11:22 pm »
I just read this in yahoo. It's intersting.


Quote
Almodovar says Hollywood "straitjacket" not for him

Fri May 19, 9:58 AM ET

Spanish director Pedro Almodovar said on Friday that Hollywood's "straitjacket" production system held little attraction for him as a filmmaker when compared to the freedom he enjoys in Europe.

The Oscar-winning director, who has won dozens of international awards with his Spanish language movies has returned to his family roots with the bitter-sweet comedy "Volver" at the Cannes Film Festival and said he has yet to see a proposal for a film in English that he'd like to shoot.

"There is always a temptation to shoot in English. But I was never proposed a film that interested me enough," he told reporters in Cannes after the presentation of "Volver."
"I'm afraid that in Hollywood I would not have the same freedoms as in Europe. If I was to shoot in English, it would not be in Hollywood, but elsewhere where there is less of a straitjacket production system," he said, speaking through a translator.

Almodovar said "Volver" ("Returning") took him back to his childhood in Spain's central region of La Mancha and was largely inspired by his sisters and late mother.
Featuring an almost exclusively female cast, the film tells the story of Raimunda (Penelope Cruz), a feisty housewife, and her sister Sole (Lola Duenas), a hairdresser, who are being visited by the very lively ghost of their dead mother.

Almodovar said talk of appearances from dead loved ones was not unusual in his home village, where women cultivated memories of the departed and spent time tending to graves -- often even their own before they are interred.

"Cleaning my grave relaxes me," one cheerful woman says in the film as others around her scrub, brush and polish their family tombstones.

A FARTING GHOST

Although "Volver" deals with death, betrayal and incest, it also has plenty of comedy as in a scene when the sisters' ghostly mother, played by Carmen Maura, requests a new haircut when she sees her image in the mirror.

"I wanted to show a ghost on a daily basis. A ghost that goes to the bathroom, hides under the bed and even farts in the film," Almodovar said.

The film marks Cruz's return to Spanish cinema after spending the last few years establishing an international career in Hollywood. Cruz has already starred in Almodovar's "All About My Mother," which won an Oscar for best foreign language film.

"There is only one Pedro for me," Cruz said. "I wouldn't have been the same one without him ... It's amazing how he knows how we feel and think ... He has a special eye for that."

The film also reunites Almodovar with Maura after a 17-year split. The actress starred in many of the director's films, including his 1987 "Women On The Verge Of A Nervous Breakdown."

"When we met for the first rehearsal, it was like it always had been," Maura said. "I was astonished because I was not sure whether we could have the same chemistry."

From Yahoo news:

http://entertainment.tv.yahoo.com/entnews/va/20060519/114805792800.html
Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement. -Mark Twain.

Offline JCinNYC2006

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #11 on: May 19, 2006, 02:48:25 pm »
Thanks for posting that.  It reminds me of when he was still kind of a novelty to Americans and was being compared/lumped together with 'outrageous' directors like John Waters.  There was even talk of remaking 'Women on the Verge' in English, I think with Jane Fonda or something.

Juan
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rtprod

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #12 on: May 19, 2006, 02:52:57 pm »
Thanks for posting that.  It reminds me of when he was still kind of a novelty to Americans and was being compared/lumped together with 'outrageous' directors like John Waters.  There was even talk of remaking 'Women on the Verge' in English, I think with Jane Fonda or something.

Juan


I remember talk of that but for some reason I am thinking it was Roseanne who wanted to remake it as a vehicle for herself.  After her brilliant comic turn in "She Devil" who could have argued?  Definitely not an LOL for her work there.  However, Meryl Streep was spot-on brilliant, as always, as Mary Fisher, the brittle romance novelist.

rt

Offline opinionista

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #13 on: May 19, 2006, 03:02:23 pm »
Thanks for posting that.  It reminds me of when he was still kind of a novelty to Americans and was being compared/lumped together with 'outrageous' directors like John Waters.  There was even talk of remaking 'Women on the Verge' in English, I think with Jane Fonda or something.

Juan


Wow, I didn't know that. But it's a good thing the american version of Women on the Verge was never made. Look what happened with the Hollywood versions of Alejandro Amenabar's movies Abre los Ojos (Vainilla Sky) and Tesis (8 Millimeters). Horrible movies. They're even embarrasing.
Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement. -Mark Twain.

rtprod

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #14 on: May 19, 2006, 03:11:21 pm »
Wow, I didn't know that. But it's a good thing the american version of Women on the Verge was never made. Look what happened with the Hollywood versions of Alejandro Amenabar's movies Abre los Ojos (Vainilla Sky) and Tesis (8 Millimeters). Horrible movies. They're even embarrasing.

Hehe.

I actually liked both of those films very much -- lol.  Vanilla Sky is more accomplished than 8MM, but the latter had some very dark thriller elements that worked for me at least.  I loved the final cemetery show-down between Nicolas Cage and the killer.  Got a real sense of evil there.  It's just a trashy b-movie but fairly well made, at least I thought at the time.  Neither of those is as bad as the remake of The Vanishing, the terrific Dutch thriller that was remade in Hollywood with a new ending--by the SAME DIRECTOR.

To digress, as far as Cameron Crowe goes, Elizabethtown made Vanilla Sky look like a masterpiece.

rt
« Last Edit: May 19, 2006, 03:43:59 pm by rtprod »

Offline JCinNYC2006

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #15 on: May 19, 2006, 03:55:28 pm »
Wow, I didn't know that. But it's a good thing the american version of Women on the Verge was never made. Look what happened with the Hollywood versions of Alejandro Amenabar's movies Abre los Ojos (Vainilla Sky) and Tesis (8 Millimeters). Horrible movies. They're even embarrasing.
Was 8MM based on Tesis?  I haven't seen Tesis yet, but I loved Abre Los Ojos, as strange as it was.  I haven't even seen The Sea Inside yet, I haven't been in the mood to watch something so charged.  But I freakin love anything I've seen Eduardo Noriega in. That's a fine mofo right there!

Juan
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rtprod

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #16 on: May 19, 2006, 03:57:53 pm »
Was 8MM based on Tesis?  I haven't seen Tesis yet, but I loved Abre Los Ojos, as strange as it was.  I haven't even seen The Sea Inside yet, I haven't been in the mood to watch something so charged.  But I freakin love anything I've seen Eduardo Noriega in. That's a fine mofo right there!

Juan

Noriega is always good but Burnt Money was a miss for me.  For all the phony smoldering between them they gave us no sensuality between the two men, only between Leonardo Sarabaglia and a woman.


Offline JCinNYC2006

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #17 on: May 19, 2006, 04:14:40 pm »
Ultimately yeah, it was a letdown.  I had high expectations based on the opening scene in the men's room, but the climactic shootout was cool.  I don't remember who the director was or if I've seen anything else of his.

Juan
What is essential, is invisible to the eye....

Offline opinionista

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #18 on: May 19, 2006, 04:21:34 pm »
Was 8MM based on Tesis?  I haven't seen Tesis yet, but I loved Abre Los Ojos, as strange as it was.  I haven't even seen The Sea Inside yet, I haven't been in the mood to watch something so charged.  But I freakin love anything I've seen Eduardo Noriega in. That's a fine mofo right there!

Juan

Yes 8MM is based on Tesis. Funny thing is the school of journalism the leading character of Tesis goes to is the same one I go to. It was filmed in the very same building, so everytime I'm there I remember the film.

Quote
Noriega is always good but Burnt Money was a miss for me.  For all the phony smoldering between them they gave us no sensuality between the two men, only between Leonardo Sarabaglia and a woman.

I agree, no chemistry between them in Burnt Money. BTW Leonardo Sbaraglia is so HOT! I used to see him quite often at the pool at community gym (he lives in Madrid, and swims a lot), and I was always drooling. We live in the same neighborhood (or used to). But I haven't come back to that pool, so I haven't seen him in a long time.

Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement. -Mark Twain.

Offline opinionista

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #19 on: May 19, 2006, 04:26:05 pm »
Quote
I don't remember who the director was or if I've seen anything else of his.

The director was Marcelo Piñeyro, he's argentinan. He also directed a movie I saw a long time ago, that also features Sbaraglia: Wild Horses. I liked it. He has another movie, El Método it was released last year. I haven't seen it but a friend of mine says it's pretty good.
Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement. -Mark Twain.

rtprod

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #20 on: May 19, 2006, 04:36:11 pm »
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:


OKAY, now why has no one thrown a little love to Pen here?  Come on guys, don't fail me...  :-)

rt

Offline opinionista

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #21 on: May 19, 2006, 04:51:12 pm »
I personally don't like Penelope Cruz very much. She isn't that well liked here actually, not as much as it seems. Most people consider her a total bitch.  But a bitch or not,  I have to admit that she is improving a lot as an actress. I think she did a great job in Volver (I haven´t seen that one she made in Italy), but she's not exactly my favorite actress. Sorry. There are other actresses here in Spain that are way more talented than she is and pull out impressive performances like Leonor Watling, Pilar Bardem or Marisa Paredes. It's just that Penelope made it in Hollywood and because of that she's more on the spotlight but she's not the best thing from Spain. Neither is Banderas. Javier Bardem and Luis Tosar are way better than Banderas. But that's just my opinion.
« Last Edit: May 19, 2006, 04:53:05 pm by opinionista »
Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement. -Mark Twain.

rtprod

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #22 on: May 19, 2006, 05:00:16 pm »
I personally don't like Penelope Cruz very much. She isn't that well liked here actually, not as much as it seems. Most people consider her a total bitch.  But a bitch or not,  I have to admit that she is improving a lot as an actress. I think she did a great job in Volver (I haven´t seen that one she made in Italy), but she's not exactly my favorite actress. Sorry. There are other actresses here in Spain that are way more talented than she is and pull out impressive performances like Leonor Watling, Pilar Bardem or Marisa Paredes. It's just that Penelope made it in Hollywood and because of that she's more on the spotlight but she's not the best thing from Spain. Neither is Banderas. Javier Bardem and Luis Tosar are way better than Banderas. But that's just my opinion.

Hmm.  I only know her from the films I have seen her in back to Bigas Luna's Jamon, Jamon, which I think was my first experience with her.  But I think she's pretty terrific in Spanish-speaking roles and truly exceptional in All About My Mother and especially, as I noted above, Don't Move.  She was also very good in a TNT movie named Noel, directed by Chazz Palmenteri last year, where she played opposite Paul Walker (terrific performance) who was her abusive boyfriend.  Marisa Parades is hands down, my very, very favorite Spanish actress.  Ever see her in "Savages" some time back?  WHOAH.  Never released here in the states but I saw it on a film festival a few years ago and she was unbelievable. 

I love Bardem too much to describe and for all the obvious reasons.  However, Banderas is a major, major talent.  I saw him on Broadway in Nine a few seasons ago, and he was truly spectacular--charisma, very good singer and even better dancer, and that is a tough show to pull off if you've ever heard the music and lyrics.  He is a great example of a talented guy pigeonholed, again, by the American studio system. 

rt

« Last Edit: May 19, 2006, 05:18:43 pm by rtprod »

Offline opinionista

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Re: OT: "Volver", Pedro Almodovar's new movie: A MUST SEE
« Reply #23 on: May 19, 2006, 05:09:26 pm »
You could be right about Banderas. I've never seen him in a theater play. But I haven't been impressed by none of his performances in movies so far, at least not as much as Bardem. Have you seen Los Lunes al Sol? (Mondays in the Sun). It's one of the best Spanish movies I have seen. Bardem does incredibly good there. I also liked Bigas Luna's La Teta y la Luna (The Tit and The Moon). 
« Last Edit: May 19, 2006, 05:30:15 pm by opinionista »
Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement. -Mark Twain.