aka HABLE CON ELLA
Movie Review by Alice Castle
Starring: Javier Camara, Dario Grandinetti, Rosario Flores, Leonor Watling, Geraldine Chaplin
Director: Pedro Almodóvar
Almodovar, as is customary, never disappoints on the originality scale, as with his latest film TALK TO HER. This time the focus is not completely on his female characters but on two men who lose their female loves to the mysterious twilight world of coma. The two men, unlikely companions, form a friendship through circumstance – spending time together in the hospital watching over their girlfriends and sharing what would seem their loss. In the one case, Benigno (Javier Camara) has become a male nurse so that he can watch over his beloved Alicia (Leonor Watling) a promising young ballet dancer before she was injured in a road accident. In contrast Marco (Dario Grandinetti) a journalist, finds it difficult to spend time and almost impossible to talk to his comatose girlfriend – Lydia (Rosario Flores), a former bull-fighter injured in the ring.
This is a tale of impossible love and the way different people cope with grief. As the story progresses it emerges that Benigno – who has led a very sheltered life caring for his ailing mother until she died – has a somewhat unhealthy obsession with Alicia. Despite his good intentions, society frowns upon his behaviour, and only Marco can try and protect him from the real world and its rules. Superb performances from all the leads – and some very truly Almodovarian cinema.
