Out of Frame: Volver
Pedro Almodóvar's latest film, Volver, was screened in a few suburban locations last month, but it has just opened on two screens at the E Street Cinema. Fans of the legendary Spanish director do not need a review to tell them to see this film. However, those who do not know Almodóvar's work, or who have had a bad experience with it, should give this excellent movie a chance. It has all of the positive qualities of his earlier films — the sometimes off-color humor; the idolization of the eternal feminine; the mixture of fantasy and reality; the flavor of Spain — just this time without the drag queens and transsexual prostitutes.
The heart of the movie takes place in a small village in La Mancha, the natal region of both Don Quixote and Pedro Almodóvar. Two sisters, Raimunda (Penélope Cruz) and Soledad (Lola Dueñas), travel back and forth between their new homes in Madrid and that little town, later identified as Alcanfor de Las Infantas, the town in Spain with the highest rate of insanity among its inhabitants. The village is fictional (it was actually shot in a place called Almagro, near where Almodóvar himself was born), but the region is indeed arid and windswept, and as often happens where there are sinister winds, fires and madness abound. The frequent shots of wind turbines, generating electricity, again recall the ingenioso hidalgo of Cervantes, who mistook the 16th-century predecessors of these modern windmills for giants.
The sisters return to the village, after the death of their parents in a fire, to tend the family grave and look in on their senile aunt, Tía Paula (Chus Lampreave). Never far from this superstitious world is the presence of their mother, Irene (Carmen Maura), whose spirit the villagers believe is watching over Tía Paula. It is a touching reunion for Almodóvar and Carmen Maura, who was one of the director's favorites in the 1980s, starring in Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios and ¿Qué he hecho yo para merecer esto!. Along with Raimunda's daughter, Paula (Yohana Cobo), we have women admired by Almodóvar over the course of three generations, and they form an excellent ensemble cast, collectively awarded the "Best Actress" award when Volver was screened at Cannes. The few men in the film are small in stature, merely obstacles to be overcome.
In recent movies, Almodóvar has become obsessed with the mechanics of death and grief (the disturbing, surreal Hable con ella) and the righting of past wrongs (La Mala educación and Todo sobre mi madre). Both themes figure prominently in Volver, but in a way that is both more gentle and more powerful than any of these previous films. The movie is lovingly shot (cinematography by José Luis Alcaine), both the beauty of the village and the squalor of Madrid. Memorable scenes include the opening, where women clean sepulchers in the village cemetery, including some who are tending their own graves for when they die, and a spectacular close-up of paper towels soaking up blood.
Almodóvar is fond of allusions, and he was quite referential in this movie, with footage from Luchino Visconti's Bellissima, starring Anna Magnani as a strong female role model for Raimunda. Almodóvar's title comes from the name of a tango, by Carlos Gardel, that Raimunda sings in one of the most emotional scenes in the movie (shown in still above), precisely at the point where the narrative knots of the story begin to pull apart. (The vocal part was actually sung, quite beautifully, by Estrella Morente, a flamenco star.) For some fascinating background on the shooting, see the diary about the making of Volver that Almodóvar published on the Internet.
Penélope Cruz has not impressed when acting in English, but her seductive and innocent beauty come across better when she has the added comfort of acting in her native language. After her early appearance as the sweet and guileless Luz in Belle époque, the recent partnership with Almodóvar has yielded some of her best work, in Todo sobre mi madre and Carne trémula. In this lead, she shines beyond what we might have expected from previous roles. Here she is aged beyond her years especially by the use of a butt prosthesis, something she discussed in an interview with NPR. Cruz's performance is the main reason to see Volver, but one still can enjoy oneself along the way.