"Live Flesh" (1997)

(Originally released as Carne Tremula)

Starring: Javier Bardem, Francesca Neri, Liberto Rabal, Angela Molina, Jose Sancho, Penelope Cruz

First, The Lowdown: A former inmate plans revenge on the cop who imprisoned him by seducing his wife. And then it gets weird.

Okay, I confess. I’m quickly becoming a fan of Pedro Almodovar. I have enjoyed everything I’ve watched by him so far and look forward to seeing more. In case you guys haven’t figured it out, I am getting the majority of my movies via NetFlix, a service that I am completely enslaved to. Within a week of subscribing I found out that there is a maximum of 500 movies one can have in their queue. This discovery came about because when you place one movie into your queue, NetFlix suggests about a dozen others. So being the obsessive-compulsive movie addict I am, I added as many as I could. This will probably explain for many of you the weird trends in cinema I keep taking.

Okay, confession’s over.

Madrid, 1970: While radios broadcast a declaration of a nation state of emergency, a young prostitute, Isabel, shrieks out as she goes into labor. Having ignored the signs of her pending childbirth for too long, Isabel and her friend Centro stop a bus so that it will take them to the hospital only to give birth anyway in transit. An otherwise ordinary birth causes a brief sensation in the local media, and both Isabel and her new son, Victor, are given lifetime bus passes.

Fast forward twenty years. Victor is now a socially awkward pizza delivery boy with, Elena, a hooker he had a tryst with the night before. Elena is concerned with scoring more drugs than meeting Victor again, so when Victor shows up at her door, he is not greeted warmly. On the street two police officers, David and Sancho, patrol the quarters known for prostitution and drugs. Sancho is an abusive alcoholic, and David detests his superior’s habits and attitude, but the both are duty-bound to work with each other. Elena tries to forcibly eject Victor from her flat by threatening him with a gun. They scuffle and the gun goes off, knocking out Elena in the process. A neighbor hears the gunshot and calls the police. Responding to the call, Sancho and David see Elena and Victor fighting in the window. Thinking they have an assault on their hands, the burst into Elena’s flat, which panics Victor. He quickly grabs Elena’s gun and holds her hostage. But while David attempts to calm Victor down, Sancho grows increasingly impatient and tackles the younger man to wrest the gun away from him. The gun goes off, hitting David in the back.

Fast forward 2 years. Victor is now in prison for his attack on the police officers and David is now paralyzed from the waist down. David refuses to let his disability get him down and helps the Spanish wheelchair basketball team get the gold medal in the Barcelona Olympiad and is married to Elena.

Fast forward four years. Victor has now gotten out of prison and David has been riding high on his success in the Olympics with a professional sports career and multiple product endorsements. Elena, however, has been managing an orphanage. While in jail, Victor devoted his time to studying the bible and taking correspondence college courses in teaching. Isabel, Victor’s mother, succumbed to cancer while he was imprisoned, so he visits her grave. At the same time, however, Elena and David are attending the funeral of Elena’s father. Seeing them awakens the seed of vengeance in Victor and he formulate a plan to seduce Elena.

As he leaves the cemetery, he encounters Clara. The two begin to socialize and an affair begins. Later we find out that Clara is Sancho’s wife, and is repeatedly abused during his drunken tirades. Victor volunteers at Elena’s orphanage, against her protests, but proves to be such a devoted worker to the children that Elena cannot find a good reason to dismiss him. Hearing of this, David becomes increasingly paranoid as to Victor’s intentions and begins following him.

The one thing I find frustrating about Pedro Almodovar’s films is that they are so visually and dramatically complex that it makes it difficult to review them without giving away too much plot. This film is particularly layered visually there are several scenes that manage to advance the plot in mere seconds that would take another director minutes to reveal. And yet nothing feels too rushed. One thing I am thankful for is the amount of characterization we are given during the course of the movie. If done by an American director, the nature of Victor’s birth and incarceration would probably have been told as exposition rather than demonstrated.

Line of the movie: “This sums up my life. Dragging myself along to be near you.”

Four stars. Void where prohibited.

"The Emperor And The Assassin" (1998)

(Originally released as Jing Ke Ci Qin Wang)

Starring: Gong Li, Fengyi Zhang, Zhou Sun, Xiaohe Lu, Zhiwen Wang, Kaige Chen, Yongfei Gu

First, the Lowdown: An epic portrayal of the unification of China in the Qin dynasty.

Not too many westerners are abreast of Chinese history, but I’ve always found it fascinating. As with the legacy of all monarchies: the further you go back, the more the line between fact and legend is blurred. In fact, when it comes to the stories of the early unification, there is often more legend than fact.

In 220 BC, Ying Zheng, the newly crowned King of Qin, seeks to carries out his clan’s legacy: to unify the seven warring states under one banner. The idea being that unification will bring about an age of peace and thusly end the centuries of battle that had been ripping the land apart. However, it seems to be only a good idea on paper and not in practice. Rather than using diplomacy to appeal to the neighboring kingdoms, Ying Zheng is determined on overtaking them by force.

Ying Zheng’s only constant companion is Lady Zhao, a concubine from the kingdom of Zhao. Lady Zhao’s loyalty is divided between her king and her homeland, though. When the Qin army sacks the capital of Han, Ying Zheng sets his eyes his eyes on the province of Yan. But Ying Zheng knows that if he attacks Yan without provocation, the remaining states may sympathize and unite against the Qin army. To generate the excuse he needs, Ying Zheng plans on releasing a hostage he has held from Yan, a prince, with the hopes that the prince will send an assassin to kill him. Ying Zheng tells this to Lady Zhao, who recommends she be exiled with the Yan prince, to earn his trust and make sure that all goes as planned. To complete the illusion, Lady Zhao has her face branded like a prisoner before she leaves.

However, Lady Zhao’s true motives for assisting prince Yan are so that she can leave the stifling atmosphere of palace and be free to express herself. While in the Yan province, she finds a recalcitrant assassin, Jing Ke, and sees him as the perfect person to set against Ying Zheng. Lady Zhao initially follows along with Ying Zheng’s conspiracy out of duty and love, but when Ying Zheng slaughters the armies of Zhao, her homeland, she sees the king’s thirst for conquest as it truly is – madness.

For an epic of war and conquest, The Emperor and the Assassin is very sparing on large scale battle sequences. Where most movies would’ve added an extra 15 minutes are more so you could see the sacking of Han or the slaughter of Zhao in its entirety, this film spends more time on the human intrigue aspects than on the war. In fact many of these scenes help illustrate the grandeur of the Qin palace, and also emphasize the smallness of Ying Zheng.

Line of the movie: “Even a knife has a name.”

Four and a half stars. Burn, baby, burn.

"Bad Education" (2004)

(Originally released as La Mala Educacion)

Starring: Gael Garcia Bernal, Fele Martinez, Daniel Gimenez Cacho, Lluis Homar, Francisco Maestre

First, the Lowdown: A Spanish film director is reunited with the mysterious love of his boyhood.

What is it about Pedro Almodovar and his ability to make otherwise odd emotional content seem almost normal (bordering on blasé?) I can’t tell too much about the movie without giving away its entirety because of how layered the plot is. But I might as well give you a bigger sample than the Lowdown above, because otherwise you’ll never want to watch it.

Enrique Goded is a critically acclaimed independent filmmaker. While scanning through tabloids for imagery to base a script on, an old friend Ignacio pays him a visit. Ignacio and Enrique attended the same Catholic academy together and were each other’s first love. Ignacio gives Enrique a short story that he’d been working on for the last few years based on his experiences at school (including being molested by a priest). Enrique knows a hit when he sees it and immediately wants to put the film into production. Seeing his first love, however, has sparked a feeling of confused nostalgia for Enrique which doesn’t seem to be returned at first.

As with Talk To Her, this movie works in multiple layers, each of them dependent on the other. The great thing about the film is that you don’t realize how complex it is until you try describing it to someone else. Another aspect I appreciated about the movie is that while it addresses the touchy subjects of homosexuality, child molestation in the Catholic Church, and drug abuse – deals with those matter-of-factly and never soapboxes at any point. The main characters are gay, but this isn’t a “gay movie”; Ignacio was raped by a priest and seeks revenge, but this isn’t a “victim flick” or a “revenge flick” either.

One subject matter that permeates the film is how one’s nostalgia is often tinted and blurred. Enrique’s feelings of his boyhood romance are vastly different than Ignacio’s, which confuses him. And the more Enrique looks into his past, the more he finds that what he colorfully remembered and what had happened are vastly different things.

Line of the movie: “Although he let me sleep with him, I could not penetrate him.”

Four stars. Don’t hate me because I’m beautiful.

"Shanghai Triad" (1995)

(Originally Released as Yao A Yao Yao Dao Waipo Qiao)

Starring: Gong Li, Li Baotian, Wang Xiaoxiao, Xuejian Li, Chun Sun, Biao Fu, Shu Chen

First, the Lowdown: A peasant boy is hired to be the servant of a gangster’s mistress.

I know, yet another Chinese drama starring Gong Li. Deal. At a foggy Shanghai port, Shuisheng is picked up by his Uncle Liu. Uncle works for the Tang crime family and is sponsoring Shuisheng so that he may escape his peasant life in the country. Almost immediately, Shuisheng is confronted with a complete change of life from his home in the country. Before he is even given his assignment, Shuisheng witnesses a gangland execution.

Shuisheng is placed in the service of Bijou, a cabaret singer who is mistress to the leader of the Tang crime family. Bijou is spoiled and arrogant, and impulsive to a dangerous degree. When Uncle Liu is killed protecting his boss, Shuisheng realizes that there is more to working for a gangster than being at the call of his mistress.

In the middle of the night, Shuisheng, Bijou, and Boss Tang are spirited away to a tiny island off the coast of Shanghai, so that they may lie low and avoid Tang’s rival, Fat Yu. Bijou finds the island lethargic and claustrophobic, especially since she is deprived of an audience for her outbursts. However, it’s only in this limited environment where she realizes the consequences to her laissez faire attitude.

Zhang Yimou is an excellent director, with a distinctive eye. Unfortunately, without a story to back it up, what you have is a soap opera with better sets. The entirety of the movie can be summed up with its opening scene: a close-up of Shuisheng, looking left and right in confused amazement of the busy port that we don’t get to see. Shuisheng is the weakest character in the entire film, and unfortunately he is also the most prominent. Being a servant, he is not told anything about what happens around him, nor is allowed to interact with the stronger presences around him, and thusly neither is the audience.

Line of the movie: “The older you get, the more you know about pain.”

Three and a half stars. Boo-ya!