Volver
Since the nearest videotheque is shit after all, we weren’t able to watch either Charade, Science of Sleep, Amores Perros or 2001. So in the end, we unwillingly decided for Volver, but oh, what a great surprise it was! I remember very well how Shii described the film as “woman-friendly” and not all that great, so I wasn’t really looking forward watching that film. Almodóvar is getting old and I feared that you can see it in the film (just like I didn’t really like “Broken Flowers” because it kind of lacked Jim Jarmusch’s freshness from his earlier films). However, I was totally wrong.
Sure, Volver is kind of different from his other films – we have a prostitute, but she’s not all that important, and especially we don’t have any transvestites at all (how unusual! XD). Basically all of Almodóvar’s typical aspects are missing except for Penélope Cruz, maybe. And even though I love his transvestites, this film has brought in other great and fresh elements, which are an optimistic end, humour and family relationships. Also, this film was just much more cliché-ish spanish than the others (all those neighbours *ahaha*)
The funniest scenes were still the ones with la russa… “Raimunda!” *HAHAHA* The humour was a very simple one, but oh so great! I don’t recall having ever laughed at Almodóvar’s films and I think he does well on this.
I also really like Penélope Cruz’ performance in this film; she seems much more mature and much more believable as independent and spirited woman than in her other roles, even though the little innocent girl matches her face perfectly. She also stayed very likeable through the whole story and I hope she will get together with that guy from the film crew. But then again, that would have distracted from the focus on her mother and it’s good that they left it like that :]
In the moment she suddenly started to sing, I really feared that it would kill the mood (on a sidenote, I usually hate singing in films, except for “Singin’ in the Rain”), but it didn’t! It was nice to include the title into the song and it actually had an emotional impact on me.
I guess I don’t need to mention how much I love the poster for Volver – it’s cliché and all, yeah, but so damn sexy. Also, I love the red which goes so well with Raimunda’s character that I’m wondering why we never see her in a dark red dress. To come back to the aspect of “woman-friendliness” – it didn’t bother me at all. It was not like “All women are good, all men are bad”, it was just that the whole story revolved around women. So it’s more “woman-centered” than “woman-friendly” in my eyes and I ended up liking all the characters (except for Agustina maybe). In the end, it seems like I’m having a totally other opinion about this film than everybody else *heh*
Now the next thing I should do is to watch this film with the commentaries by Almodóvar and Cruz. I did this for “Hable con ella” and it was really enlightening. I really thought that I’ve understood much more about the film by seeing the commentaries. Especially the dancing scene at the beginning gained meaning for me after his explanation.
Interesting that I can badmouth a movie for you so strongly. *hihi*
Actually I didn’t think the movie was bad at all (it was a great fun to watch with all these lovely characters) – “Volver” is just worse than Almodóvar’s other movies IMO. “Volver” didn’t have that emotional impact on me that (especially the beginning of) “All About My Mother” or “Hable con ella” had.
Hm, but – oh well – “High Heels” and “The Flower of My Secret” also didn’t make me feel enthusiastic, although both of them were nice. Maybe I have just too high expectations of Almodóvar’s movies?
Yeah, maybe it really comes down to what you expect from a film. Lately it was nearly always the case for me that I was disappointed by films I had high hopes for while others were a positive surprise.
True, Volver is not very emotional, but I think it’s just too funny to be all that emotional. Also, the storyline was much more mainstream and simpler than his other films, especially “All about my mother” was very deep, imho. Also, Almodóvar likes to put a lot of melancholic thoughts on love relationships and death – which wasn’t the case here at all, love and death were treated in a less serious way than usual. So yeah, I can see that Volver can easily be a disappointment for Almodóvar fans.