" The only thing I've been addicted to in my life is making movies." - Pedro Almodóvar
On May 17th, local time, Cannes, France, after the film screening, the audience stood up and applauded. After that, the film received a score of 3.4 (full score) on the day's publication (a publication that was judged and scored by professional international media). 4 points), the highest score in Cannes so far.
The film entered competition, earning the director his sixth Palme d'Or nomination of his career, but the ending was exactly the same as the previous five, and it was not named on the final list of winners. This dramatic work is the semi-autobiographical work "Pain and Glory" by Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar , which is the 22nd feature film in his nearly 40-year career and his sixth time winning gold. The Palm nominations missed it once again.
Such drama, placed on Almodovar, will not appear abrupt at all. As far as his creative boldness and unrestrainedness are concerned, he can be said to be the unparalleled Drama Queen among European directors.
In Almodovar's previous films, there have been revenge-obsessed wives ("The Legend of the Martyr"), vegetative girls who have been forced by gentle caregivers who have taken care of them for four years, and monkeys with girls everywhere. The man who turned his head off again ("All About My Mother"), and the father who transformed the man who raped his daughter into the appearance of his dead wife and finally fell in love with him ("The Skin of My House").
Erotica, death, violence, and sexual promiscuity are the iconic elements of his films, and strange feelings can be said to be the signature of his creation. Whether it is exaggerated or unruly, it is undeniable that in Almodovar's films, the undertones are always humanity and tenderness. He himself said, "The characters in my films include killers and rapists, but I have never Treating them as criminals, I'm just showing their humanity."
"Desire" can be said to be the key word embedded in the Spanish national philosophy of life. There is a Spanish proverb that says, "Desire is the essence of man" (El deseoeslaesenciadelhombre). Desire is the driving force of human action, and has nothing to do with good or evil. The lack of desire means that life is stagnant at the most basic level.
In Almodovar there are many forms of desire. On the side of those in power in a patriarchal society, desire = sex = mastery of power and violence, such as the raping police officer in "The Legend of the Strong Woman", while on the side of women, who are always more "preferred", desire is shown as a response to oppression resistance, and a more gentle, expansive and healing tenacity and tolerance.
The intense colors, extremely dramatic plots, and intricate sexual orientations and relationships in Almodóvar's films are not his unique creative elements and themes, but only in his shots, they appear the most natural, warm and sincere, making the One can recognize Almodóvar at a glance because he pours a part of himself into each of his works.
After filming other people's stories for nearly 40 years, Almodovar finally turned the camera on himself this time, at least half of it - "Pain and Glory" is a semi-autobiographical work, and most of the plots are related to his own. In this story, sex, desire and death are still not absent, but the irony and sharpness of youth are all transformed into restrained tenderness here. , "It's not like Almodovar anymore."
Of course, Almodovar is still Almodovar, but his experience and illness made him hand over a new work that is completely different from the past. Some people say that this is his best work for many years.
Salvador, the protagonist of "Pain and Glory", is a director who has almost never stopped working. In his later years, he fell into the dual predicament of physical pain and creative bottleneck. From this, he began to recall his childhood, his mother and his gay lovers when he was young, and even Including their own initial sexual initiation experiences.
El Salvador is played by Antonio Banderas, Almodovar's royal male protagonist. At the beginning of the film, it shows the fragile body of an elderly man, with a gray beard, a body floating underwater, and a long scar on his back. superior.
As the camera zooms in, Banderas's face overlaps with a stream of water as he recalls the river where his mother washed clothes as a child, and the shot is filled with dreamy warm tones.
Playing the mother is also the Spanish national treasure actor Penelope Cruz, who has worked with Almodovar for many years and can even be said to have been trained by him.
Once upon a time, Banderas and Penelope, as actors, were most labeled as "sexy", one was a Latin lover, the other was a Spanish rose, and in "Pain and Glory", both of them were completely taken off. This layer of floating light is completely integrated with the character.
Banderas, a fragile and aging author-director, with this look and look, at first glance, it is impossible to even recognize him.
Penelope, on the other hand, is completely the image of a strong mother, carrying the child alone, and the role of her husband is here, as usual, she is absent, except to take her mother to a cave to live in, there is no other role. . To translate it, in the eyes of Almodóvar, the "friend of women", men are useless pigs' hooves.
In Almodóvar's previous works, the irony and criticism of the "big pig trotters" were far sharper, and in "Pain and Glory", these angry criticisms turned into more moderate observations, and even forgiveness. Including his display of illness, he is also full of a helpless and optimistic self-mockery. For example, he used various vivid animations to express his tinnitus, asthma, headache, and back pain. When talking about headaches, he said, "My expertise also includes all kinds of headaches" , playfully avoiding falling into The possibility of self-pity.
The story is reality-memories running in two lines. In this line of reality, Salvador visits his co-leader Alberto (Asher Etse) because an old work from 32 years ago was remade. Andia), the two broke up after the filming, and Alberto was surprised by the surprise visit.
However, what was shocking was that, after a while, the two of them were having fun in the backyard, the frost melted in an instant, and the atmosphere relaxed. This is the first time the theme of "reconciliation" has appeared.
And the part of memories is interspersed with El Salvador's high state. In my memories, I have the experience of living with my mother in a "hole in the ground" in the village where my father worked, the story of teaching a young painter literacy, and the story of being sent to a church school because the family had no money. The painter's young body gave El Salvador his first sexual initiation: he fainted on the spot after seeing the painter taking a bath.
This expressive technique of externalizing spiritual experience gently and clearly expresses a little boy's first experience of sex, without sharpness or filth, but the blushing face of the little actor gives a pure and beautiful feeling.
As the reality part of the plot progresses, Alberto discovers a new play, "Addiction," which El Salvador is working on, which leads to another episode: El Salvador's first love.
This is the most touching part of the whole film. At Alberto's request and volunteering, "Addiction", which originally did not want to be released, was performed in the theater, and happened to be seen by the prototype of the protagonist of the story, El Salvador's young lover Federico, This moving one-man show made him very moved in the audience.
Thirty-two years later, the old lovers reunite. Although Cedric already has a family and a heterosexual partner, the attraction between the two still exists, both mentally and physically, but El Salvador chooses to end the story with a kiss .
I have to say that Banderas's performance in this scene is really amazing. The excitement of the reunion and the emotion of hard work are all in his eyes that are faintly twinkling with tears.
He used his own performance to practice Salvador in the film, which is actually also Almodovar's request for good actors. "A good actor does not cry a lot, but tries his best not to cry."
In fact, this past episode is also a replica of Almodovar’s own personal experience. This episode that happened 30 years ago also ended because of drugs, but the ending was completely different from the movie. Almodovar described the pain as like It was "cutting off his own arm abruptly" .
And Salvador, played by Banderas, ended the relationship in an adult way instead of Almodóvar, and sutured the wound for him.
This is another story of reconciliation, Salvador, and Almodóvar's reconciliation with the past, and the sincere affection he put into this story, through the stories he wrote, the performances of the actors and the reconciliation of the past. The co-interpretation of the photographer Jose Luis Arcane, who Dova called "The Light of My Residence", was conveyed from the screen to the hearts of the audience, making people sigh and smile.
The final reconciliation in the film is between El Salvador and his dying mother. The mother never liked the films he made, and he failed to follow her mother's last wish to send her back to the village at the last minute, although it was more like a It is a kind of regret, but to a certain extent, telling and repenting is also a way of psychological compensation.
At the end of the film, we return to the railway station where El Salvador was stranded with his mother as a child, but as the camera zooms out, a staff member holding a microphone to listen to the sound appears in the picture. It turns out that the "memories" we saw before were Another work by Salvador in the film.
Almodovar ended the work in the way he is good at drama within a play, giving us a sense of time travel, reality and fiction, past and present, Almodovar who made this story and we are watching The Memories of Salvador, the author of stories, intertwined with each other, prove to us the irreplaceable charm of movies to reshape time and space, and Almodóvar's confession, "The only thing I've been addicted to in my life is making movies."
(This article first published the neets tabloid)
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