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Talk to Her
Pedro Almodover
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How will Pedro Almodovar surprise us next? From the beginning he showed an original vision driven by a queer sensibility as engaging as it was quirky­ remember his 1984 What Have I done to Deserve This? and Pepi, Luci, Bom (filmed in 1980, but released in the US in 1992). His 1987 Law of Desire bright a healthy dose of gay sex and trangenderism into his work, and the release of Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown in 1988 gained him world recognition as a major artist. Critic Pauline Kael called the early Almodovar an "underground theater clown" and claimed that some of the film's routines would be classic bits of comic material if their timing wasn't so quirky. But this wasn't really a criticism, she added, because Almodovar didn't seem to care that much about timing; he was just happy to put on a good show.

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As usual, Kael was right­ the zest and enormous appeal of all of Almodovar's films is that he loves putting on a show. Whether it was the nuns on acid in the 1983 Dark Habits or the sinister plot twists of the 1997 Live Flesh, Almodovar has always known how to make us sit up in our seats and pay attention. His situations are outlandish and absurd: it was as though Beckett, rejoicing in the new freedoms of the post-Franco years, had decided to rewrite everyday Spanish life through the lens of "Jerry Lewis" and "Three's Company." What's changed over the years is Almodovar's ability to move us with deeply empathic connections between viewers and characters. In the earlier films­ including Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown­ he was content simply to present us with the arcane, often hilarious, frenzied absurdities of life.

We knew his characters had feelings­ God knows, they carried on enough about them­ but the director didn't seem to care so much about our bond to the characters. If anything, we were prompted to laugh at their foibles and even their pain. This began changing in 1995 with the curious comedy drama The Flower of My Secret and especially in the 1999 All About My Mother. But what did not change was his ability to be the "underground theater clown."

While Talk to Her­ written as well as directed by Almodovar­ does not have the exquisite emotional resonance and detail displayed in All About My Mother, it's a fully realized and stunning film. We first see Benigno (Javier Cámara) and Marco (Darío Grandinetti), the film's heroes (of sorts), at a dance performance by choreographer Pina Bausch. Almodovar's implication is that they are both gay, and we wait for them to finally meet one another; but there is far more to happen before we get to their highly-charged relationship.

Benigno is the nurse to Alicia (Leonor Watling), a young ballerina in a coma from a car accident two years earlier. He is deeply obsessed with her. Marco meets and falls in love with Lydia (Rosario Flores), a bull-fighter who, in the first quarter of the film, is seriously gored and also ends up in a coma. The men meet again at the hospital, where Benigno teaches Marco how to talk to and commune with the unconscious Lydia as he does with Alicia. While there's no reciprocal relationship­ the unconscious Alicia is the passive object of Benigno's obsessive adoration­ Marco begins to learn how to treat Lydia not as someone who's essentially died, but someone in another state of living. The two men become friends, even as Marco remains (rightly so) deeply suspicious of Benigno's mental stability.

The men's relationship begins to change when Lydia dies and Alicia is discovered to be pregnant. From there the film becomes increasingly byzantine and emotionally haywire.

Almodovar draws upon his earlier work­ there are hints here of the 1986 Matador and Law of Desire in the themes of sexual obsession and erotic loss. But he moves far beyond what he was able to accomplish before. The adoration of women (or any loved one) here is taken to the extreme: Benigno is as slavish in his devotion to Alicia as a possessed monk is to a saint, or a demented fan to a movie star. Marco­ the doubter­ desires to learn this devotion but is always prohibited by common sense or fear. As with many of Almodovar's films, Talk to Her is a religious meditation on the nature of faith. Benigno truly believes that Alicia will once again awaken and fall in love with him. And it is this unfailing and limitless faith that finally brings happiness and (we are lead to believe) love back into Marco's life.

The queer subtext here­ is Benigno gay? What is the potential relationship between the men?­ is dwarfed by the even queerer subtext of what it means to adore someone who is unable to respond emotionally or mentally; someone who is, as it were, just flesh. The film holds Benigno's love, as deranged as it may be, as a vital and consequential human emotion. It is not just erotic and spiritual desire alone­ it is blind unyielding faith that not only contextualizes human life, but is, in the end, able to restore it.

Author Profile:  Michael Bronski
	Michael Bronski is the author of Culture Clash: The Making of Gay Sensibility and The Pleasure Principle: Sex, Backlash, and the Struggle for Gay Freedom. He writes frequently on sex, books, movies, and culture, and lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
	Email:	mabronski@aol.com