One thing that was really attractive in this movie -- the location. Where do you find a hacienda like that? When I win the power lotto, I want one.
And the photography has a -- je ne sais quoi -- an "exotic" feel to it. So much amber and so much cerulean blue, sunshine and shadows.
As for the rest, it comes across kind of like a late-night soft-core porn movie. (Some spoilers follow, if such a plot can be spoiled. Not the climax, though, because my eyes were closed by that time.)
Let's see. Sra. Sanchez is a psychiatric aide in private service to Bursiel, who lives in that palacio and is about to come into a great deal of money, not that 30 millions takes you very far these days. The two live alone in luxury and get along swimmingly. Bursiel, the blonde, seems to like Sanchez, the sultry Mexican. Then Schultze shows up drunk one night. He's Sanchez's husband or maybe boy friend. No matter. He more or less forces himself on Sanchez who first spits on him then responds like the hot-blooded Latin she is, urging him to assault her in Spanish, which struck me as a novel touch and reminded me of liberties spent in Tijuana. It was completely at odds with her character as we'd come to know it, but that sort of thing isn't important in this kind of movie. Well, truthfully, there was one earlier scene in which Sanchez goes to a bar looking like a hooker and picks up some guy, so maybe it's not so inconsistent.
Schultze, whose acting skills are about at the same level as the other principals, which is to say almost nonexistent, is given a job doing upkeep work around the mansion. In a couple of scenes he struts around bare chested, carrying an axe, while Bursiel ogles him. Schultze and Bursiel then wind up in the sack together, to be joined by Sancheze in what Bursiel calls a "menage a trah."
Then Bursiel's Mexican boyfriend, Martin, comes to visit. Sanchez must be a little jealous because while Bursiel and Martin are necking in the next room, she deliberately cuts her hand on the butcher block and screams. Then she waits. Nobody comes. So she screams agin. Now Martin comes rushing in to bandage her hand. You have to credit continuity with seeing to it that in the next few scenes Sanchez wears that clumsy white wrapping, and over the correct hand too. But Bursiel sees through Sanchez's trick and makes some catty remark about Martin's "nursing the nurse." (I hope you're following this.) Schultze gets jealous too, of Martin's relationship to Bursiel. He pulls a dirty trick on Martin to get him out of the way.
Somewhere around here, eurythmic breathing overcame me and all I can remember is three people having simultaneous orgasms, although the scene was made up of writhing and disconnected body parts so it was impossible to tell who was doing what and to whom, and one guy having a simultaneous screaming death in a car wreck. Jung would have called this "synchronicity" and attributed some sort of meaning to it but I think we can attribute it to the writer, the director, or the editor having a bright idea after a couple of cervezas.
Well, should you see it? I don't know. Sanchez looks pretty in a sluttish way and has kewl legs. Concepts of beauty must be a cultural universal because no matter what the racial background, there are always some people in every geographic variation whom the rest of us would categorize as beautiful. Schultze's walking around with his tattooed bare chest may have the same effect on women, although I wouldn't know why. Maybe if he could act.
Let me summarize it this way. It doesn't begin badly. I thought we might be in for an updated "Persona." But about half way through it turns into the soft core porn and murder and what with the blood on the celery and all, I wouldn't bother with it.
1 out of 3 found this helpful.
Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink
