This is a part of my Pedro Almodovar Marathon.

When a movie asks you to deal with friendship, love and loss in a manner such as this it’s hard not to get emotional.

Benigno (Javier Camara) and Marco (Dario Grandinetti) develop a friendship while caring for Alicia (Leonor Watling) and Lydia (Rosario Flores), respectively, who’re both in a coma. We follow not only Benigno and Marco’s friendship but the origins of their relationships with their respective women.

Over the last two months I’ve discussed films of Almodovar and his ability to paint a picture the way one one would with a canvas as opposed to a more generalized way of thinking on filmmaking. His use of colour is such that you’re willing to believe any and all level of absurdity that you sends your way, but it also helps that he grounds his stories in character such that as long as you’re wanting to see/know more about a particular character you’re in.

With Talk To Her we follow these two relationships, which eventually lead to this friendship (as mentioned above). However, when the film opens we begin in the theatre — always one of my favourite places to start a film, show me the curtain opening to remind me I’m entering a world of fantasy and I’m happy as ever — as we see Benigno and Marco seated next to one another (yet to meet officially) watching a performance of Pina (a film I need to finish watching on a side note) and completely engulfed in the performance so far that we see Marco, and this being what first attracts Benigno to him, overcome with emotion at the theatre.

The film then takes us into the stories of Benigno and Alicia as well as Marco and Lydia, which as very entertaining romance (if I can even use that word for both) stories go are pretty enjoyable. However, the serve only as a backdrop to the eventual meeting and drama of Marco and Benigno themselves. While the film may do a lot more work creating sympathy for Marco as the true romantic, with Benigno it leaves an air of mysticism. Partly because of the role we see him play in the hospital with Alicia we want to believe he has relative good intentions but the film keeps this sense of weird about him that has us on our toes waiting for something to happen — and it does, a few times I might add — that will cause rifts all around.

Have I mentioned how beautiful Almodovar is with his camera? The film continually reminds us of the colours of Spain. I kind of found myself amazed at how it’s all in Lydia’s bullfighting outfit, which I never noticed before in any previous image related to matadors and such. We see the red of the bull cape (I don’t know if that’s the actual name for it), the yellow of the of the surface of the ring (dirt) and the black in her hat. It’s gorgeous. There’s something masculine about seeing her against this bull in a very male dominated role — something the character speaks to directly. It’s almost as if every so often when the camera pans to her she becomes particularly androgynous, and that kind of plays into the Benigno and Marco plot line as we’re to believe the homoerotic tension that exists there. It never quite goes into that territory but it exists and creates a bond of friendship that feels almost okay to go there if need be.

On an emotional level it feels almost like the opeining scene for the entire runtime. As we see this man pushing the tables and chairs out of the way of these two dancing (in a trance almost) around this room we’re shielding them from hurting themselves while they at the same time express themselves openly. We’re the guy moving tables and chairs (i.e. the women in the character’s lives) in order to watch Marco and Benigno express themselves and we become invested in it. And I love it for that.

What do you think of Talk To Her?