Como agua para chocolate
Recently, I read an article on how the problem with mistresses is that there are no greeting cards for them. Indeed, society makes a point about shunning them, no matter what reason there may be for you to be one. Considering that mistresses are typically given the harshest punishment possible – a child who is acknowledged as such, and raised in a “normal” family – it is a shame that they do not get more recognition, and therefore it is no surprise that a mistress is considered a dangerous rival to the throne of marriage, because attempting to lure the guy away from his wife and into a new marriage with her is apparently what such a mistress has to do if she wants her greeting card. Perhaps relationships would indeed be a little easier if there was some sort of acceptance for these people in ethically questionable relationships, but of course that is not the source of the problem. (And no, misogyny is also not the source of the problem – that can easily solved by coining a term for “mistress male version” and treating them exactly the same way as their female counterparts.)
The entire conflict in “Como agua para chocolate” is based on the silly family tradition that the youngest daughter is not allowed to marry, in a very similar fashion to the “Makioka Sisters”, where the silly family tradition consists of the fact that a younger sister cannot be married unless her older sister is married. While the “Makioka Sisters” emphasizes on the relationship between the sisters, “Como ague para chocolate” is mostly a love story and even has one absolutely evil character, the mother. We don’t see Pedro that much, but nevertheless he is what Tita’s world is revolving around, so in some sense he is always there. So far, so simple.
What makes the film special is everything around it – the splendor of the food presented, the supernatural occurrences in the form of the mother and the nanny, and – uh – the sex scenes. The film is strangely sensual, which is beautiful and a little disturbing at the same time. I liked the natural way the film was showing human bodies (how Spanish/Latin American that is!) but at the same time I thought the scene in which her naked silhouette was walking towards his was… odd.
The most stunning part of the film were the soft visuals and the depiction of food. Oh wow it would have made me incredibly hungry if I hadn’t watched the film while eating. At the same time, I have not seen a single tortilla in the entire film which makes me wonder what kind of Mexican food they are preparing there.
Being a woman, I found it very easy to relate to the film yet its supernatural and downright strange plot mostly made me go “huh?” I heard of the film from two people, one of which recommended it to me. In retrospect, that was actually quite surprising because the only other films I remember he liked were musicals, “Jarhead” and “Letters from Iwo Jima”. It was as if Loris told me about a chick flick he liked (not gonna happen). In essence, if you want to see a really, really strange chick flick, this film is the way to go.