Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Volver

This is topic Volver in forum Film Handlers' Movie Reviews at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Gerard S. Cohen (Member # 994) on 12-16-2006, 09:41 PM:

This film by Pedro Almodovar stars beautiful Penelope Cruz, and concerns the lives of mothers, daughters, sisters and aunts in an extended mishpukha spanning three+ generations
The plot is intricate, because the relationships hint at death, murder, incest and unfaithfulness. The only significant male characters are offscreen, but they create, by their sexual infidelities, all the crimes and complications of the story that cause the women pain and concealment. The females come off as ambitious, strong and creative.
Almodovar uses the recurrent motif of spinning windmills to both extend the title's meaning of "turn", "return", "spin" as the plot unwinds, and to indicate that relationships are not what they seem, even as Don Quixote was so fooled.
The film is a comedy, with even the grim scenes having their touches of irony or slapstick.
In beautiful widescreen color, Iberian Spanish with English titles, 12/16/06 at the Kew Forest Cinema in Queens, NY