Extended Film Review- Pedro Almodovar's VOLVER (2014)

Volver Synopsis

Sister’s Raimunda (Penelope Cruz) and Sole (Lola Dueñas) return to the windy rural village of their childhood,  Alcanfor de las Infantas to visit the grave of their mother Irene (Carmen Maura) and their aging and batty Aunt Paula (Chus Lampreave). While there, they are dismayed by the senility of their aunt, yet confused by rumours that the ghost of their late mother is taking care of her. Back in Madrid, Raimunda and her teenage daughter Paula (Yohana Cobo) return to husband and father Paco, a useless unemployed drunk. In a desperate attempt at self defence from his sexual abuse, Paula accidentally murders Paco and Raimunda must face the consequences, covering for her daughter’s crime in an act of devotion.  Meanwhile, the single Sole, who is a hairdresser also living in Madrid, discovers some secrets about the ghost  of her mother, which brings the whole family together in a twist of mystery and suspense.
  

        Review

  Volver is an intriguing exploration and return to the theme of women, rooted both in a nostalgia for the geography of Almodovar’s own childhood, and the historical past of the sisters orphaned by fire.  Volver returns to many things, as its title suggests; comedy, motherhood, ghosts of the past and Almodovar favourites Carmen Maura and Penelope Cruz, while also depicting a clear departure from the masculinity of his previous male-led films such as Hable con Ella (2004) and La Mala Educación(2002). Nominated for an Oscar for Cruz’s fiery portrayal of Raimunda,  Volver is Almodovar’s highest box office earning  production to date, and caused a critical storm in 2005.

  Volver ‘s return to motherhood in the intertwining social relations across three generations of women; Raimunda (Cruz), Paula (Cobo), Sole (Dueñas), and Irene(Maura), is a conscious homage by Almodovár to his own mother whose ethereal presence during filming he claims, offered him a sense of serenity and support. It is also a theme throughout the narrative, reminiscent of the mother love in Tacones Lejanos (1991). Like Tacones Lejanos, Volver also juxtaposes motherhood with the violent threat of the patriarch, offering  patricide as the solution. With echoes of Hollywood ‘s 1945 Mildred Pierce, Raimunda is the domestic yet fiercely independent woman, who even has some hidden culinary skills up her sleeve too, as she spontaneously takes over a restaurant. Raimunda surely represents the changing role of women in a post-Franco Spain as breadwinner in light of useless Paco’s unemployment.
  Volver marks another momentous return for Almodovár in his reunion with Carmen Maura,  since their notorious falling out after Mujeres al Borde de un Ataque de Nervios 18 years prior; a trend which the director followed again 5 years later with the dark return of Antonio Banderas in his first Almodovár production since 1990, La Piel que Habito (2011).  Maura, the ghostly supernatural mother and grandmother, is linked to her role as husband-killer in Que He Hecho Yo para Merecer Esto (1984). Cruz too, has experience playing a mother in the past, albeit not as alluring, as Volver’s Raimunda: in Carne Tremula (1997) she was the teenage prostitute, while Todo Sobre Mi Madre (1999) saw her as an HIV infected nun, impregnated by a transvestite. Volver takes a step back from these previous loud, camp vibrancies, replacing the flashbacks and reversals  of Almodóvar’s earlier Hable con Ella(2002) and La Mala Educación(2004), with a more  simplistic and transparent structure. Almódovár weaves a subtly nuanced tapestry from the two main threads of narrative, comfortably cutting between the colourfuly urban Madrid and the blander and more haunting village rurality of La Mancha.
  Like Almodovar’s Todo Sobre mi Madre, the solidarity of Raimunda, Sole, Paula and Irene, as well as the epitome of the good-hearted rural neighbour and secret keeper Agustina(Blanca Portillo), is a clear cinematic interpretation of Adrienne Rich’s ‘Lesbian Continuum’ as well as a subtle parallel to the homosocial-relations of Aranoa’s ‘Los Lunes al Sol’ four years earlier. The shooting style too, is straightforward often focusing eye level on the womens dialogue emphasising that gossip-like conversation that defines female neighbours in old –time superstitious  Spanish rural villages of the dictatorship.
  Woman is the domestic goddess in Volver, strong, formidable and sexy epitomised by Cruz’s imitation of Sophia Loren’s look. She is buxom and sophisticated sporting Massimo Gattabrusi’s dark hairstyles and black feline flicked eyeliner of Ana Lozano’s make up. This look oozes classic Italian neo-realism which Almodovár acknowledges with a 20 second clip of Anna Magnani in Visconti’s Bellisima (1951). However, this strong image of woman is still fetishized (with Cruz’s prosthetic bottom, ‘the only fake part’ of her body) and subjected to the gaze of the viewer as in an unexpected high angle shot Raimunda’s cleavage is mischievously exposed.

  The powerful images of family ties between women are set against a backdrop of nostalgia for the past. Another high angle shot brings a stark contrast to Raimunda’s cleavage at Tía paula’s funeral with the congregation of mourning women oppressively akin to the women of Lorca’s La Casa de Bernada Alba. This compliments the lack of individuality of hoards of male mourners resigned to the courtyard outside. The the opening shot, where the camera slowly pans from right to left of a cemetery evokes a return to the past, as the women of the village ritualistically clean the gravestones of their loved ones. The village is its own character too, with a wind of insanity generated centuries ago by Cervantes’ Don Quixote, and an eerie pre-Franco aesthetic of La Mancha stoned streets and sober facades and courtyards which both intrigues and disturbs. This could also be said of the famous elevated plains or ‘meseta’ of La Mancha itself; the barren, yet picturesque central region with stark landscape which the camera sweeps across, emphasising the modern day wind turbines - a high-tech equivalent to Cervantes’ windmills. 

  This lingering presence of death, and general lack of good men, undercuts the vibrancy of the women in the thriller-esque medium long shots of  empty village streets (the wind rattling the shutters) as well as the prominence of the colour red in the rich cinematography of Jose Luis Alcaine. This visual accompaniment to the flamenco in Estrella Morente's 1961 version of ‘Volver’, evokes tones of Hitchcock with the bloodstained knife-like mystery of a Dario Argento giallo. However, this deathly mystery is frequently domesticated by the granny-style purple cardigans and practical shoes sported by Raimunda and others of the village. Alberto Iglesias’ score follows this frequent change in genre from the thriller-esque staccato strings as Raimunda cleans blood, to the more tender and intimate harp which accompanies the melodramatic reunion of mother and daughter.
Through these contrasts of the rural and urban, and the past and the present, and drama and suspense, Almodovár shows the changing role of the Spanish woman, from the end of the oppressive dictatorship in 1975 to the employment, legal abortion and same-sex marriage present in Zapatero’s socialist democracy of 2005. The lack of positive masculine roles to compliment the power of women removes some of the emotional power present in the earlier Atame(1990), however, Volver gently reminds us that a return to the past, though painful, as we hear in Cruz’s masterful lip-synching of the nostalgic Tango, can also be insightful, important and illuminating.

The Only Way Is Essex; predictable trash or really quite good?

By Joanna Biernat (Published Palatinate 2011)

Last Wednesday saw episode 8 of the ITV2 documentary soap opera ‘The Only Way Is Essex’ light up our screens. For those of you who don’t know, this ten-part British answer to ‘The Hills’ focuses on a group of well-off, well-connected and well-orange twenty somethings going about their lives and careers in Essex. The cast of characters includes Mark Wright, nightclub promoter and his aspiring pop star sister Jessica, Kirk Norcross, owner of Brentwood’s swanky ‘Sugar Hut’ nightclub and Amy Childs, a big hearted beautician with the musings of an ill-informed child. Interestingly the show’s opening assures us that ‘While the tans you see might be fake the people are all real, although some of what they do has been set up purely for your entertainment’. So that’s fake people in fake storylines. Glad we cleared that one up.
 
  In last week’s largely fictional storyline it all kicked off in Kirk and Amy’s already troubled relationship. Kirk met with the slightly horse-faced DJ Lauren Pope and we witnessed some inexcusably flirtatious hand-fondling and the mention of a drink. Of course who should very inconveniently and unpredictably walk in and catch it all, but Amy’s best mate Sam. Oh dear! Of course this all led to some confrontation by a very hurt Amy towards the end of the episode, which left the nation divided as to whether Kirk was indeed out of order or not. After all, as he put it ‘we’ve tried to work it out and it ain’t working out’. I for one hope it does work out so we can see more dates to the zoo.
 

  On the bright side of Brentwood, there were even more exciting things occurring. Jessica’s band LOLA signed a deal with new management promising a chart single within the next few weeks. As the show is filmed in real time, perhaps this is one band to watch out for? Then of course the adorable Arg and his ex/ love of his life Lydia, decided to ‘give it another try’ which was heart-warming television at its best.
 
  Admittedly though, this show does have its faults. The struggle to believe that some of the most inexpressive dialogue is spontaneous presents a barrier to truly getting lost in plot, while the Essex boy and girl stereotype pushed by the producers could be considered a little crass. Despite this however, I find that watching TOWIE is increasingly addictive. Maybe it’s those pearls of wisdom from the loveable yet somewhat crinkled Nanny Pat, the ludicrous eyelash and hair extensions, or maybe it’s just because I fancy Mark. Nonetheless here we’re witnessing the fundamentals of any good drama, even if they are hard to pick out under that thick orange sheen of fake tan. There’s conflict, intrigue, love-triangles and young romance. What more could we hope for from ITV2?
 
  As for those who are worried TOWIE misrepresents their hometown of Essex as some tawdry stereotype, well I'm not going to lie to you, we were all picturing this anyway. If anything, the ironic candour captured by the cameras has added a new popularity to that cheeky Essex charm prevalent in the show. Obviously not everyone in Essex thinks the capital of India is Pakistan or glamour models topless, just as not everyone in Kazakhstan is an anti-Semite called Borat. My advice is this: if you can’t watch this cheerfully tongue-in-cheek ‘docu-soap’ and take it with a pinch of salt, then you probably shouldn’t be allowed in front of the telly in the first place as you might accidentally sever your own head with the remote.

Tastes of Christmas from around the world: Poland

Published in Palatinate, University of Durham By Joanna Biernat 2013

There are many things about my Polish heritage that have caused me anguish throughout my life.  Most notably thirteen years spent waking up early on Saturdays to go to Polish school, and a surname which when mispronounced sounds almost exactly like ‘beermat’. Yet, one thing I will always owe to my grandparents and their arduous journey to Britain after World War Two, is the wonderful experience of a Polish Christmas. 

Most of you, I imagine, will be totally unfamiliar with the tastes and traditions of an Anglo-Polish household at this festive time of year so here is my brief guide to Wigilia, objadanie się, i  karp*

*Christmas Eve, over-eating and carp.

FASTING AND FEASTING.
Wigilia, (pronounced Vee-ghee-lya) or the Polish Christmas Eve, is traditionally a very family and food orientated day. You’re supposed to spend the day fasting and meat is strictly forbidden. However, when the first star is spotted in the sky at around 5pm (or when everyone is starving) the feasting begins. Don’t let the lack of meat throw you off; there is so much you can do with fish.  At the traditional table you can find pickled herring, pike, trout, whitefish or carp, fried, steamed, breaded or baked. 

12 COURSES.
Traditionally a polish Christmas should include 12 courses to represent the 12 apostles.  In my house that was long dismissed as too much work. There are about as many possible dishes as there are consonants in their names so it’s often difficult to narrow it down. There’s the classic Barszcz or beetroot soup which is great because each family’s recipe is different. Then of course we have Pierogi  (dumplings of unleavened dough with three traditional fillings). Poles love sauerkraut and cabbage and these are the star ingredients of dishes such as Bigos (hunter’s stew) and Gołąbki  (cabbage rolls).  For desert, if you can handle it, you may find Makowiec (poppy seed roll), Piernik(honey spiced cake) or a fruit compote. 

'I know I said I was hungry, but this...'

CARP.
Ahh carp. Wigilia just wouldn’t be Wigilia without it. Unfortunately, following a particularly traumatic Christmas in 1998 when my mother almost choked on a huge carp bone lodged in her throat, this fish dish only made a comeback to the Biernat family table in recent years. Some of my favourite recipes include baked carp in aspic or ‘Ryba w Galarecie’, and ‘Karp na Szaro’ (Carp in a spiced sauce of raisins, red wine and much more.)

After all of this, presents are hastily unwrapped and it is traditional to set off full-bellied to ‘Pasterka’ (midnight mass) at the local church to commemorate the arrival of the Three Wise Men to Bethlehem. 

QUESTIONS OF AMERICAN IDENTITY: ‘What, then, is the American, this new man?’ (Crévecoeur, 1792)


‘What is an Indian? Is he not formed of the same materials with yourself?’ (Elias Boudinot, Cherokee, ‘Address to the Whites,’ 1826)
 

How can we explore some of the ways American writers have raised and developed questions of identity (racial, ethnic, gender, sexual etc. ) in literature?

The concept of identity, to many American writers, is the central nervous system of American fiction. It can take many forms, whether it be the psychological identity challenged by Kesey’s exploration of sanity in ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’, or Cather’s humanization and characterisation of the American prairie as a living presence. The explanation as to why thematic questions of identity feature so prominently in these, and many other American works of fiction lies in the history and identity of the American people themselves.  With such a relatively recent history, literature from the United States has relied upon its own cultural, social and political past to find it’s own voice. Much unlike that of literature from Europe, American fiction has therefore had to define and challenge itself creating many unique narratives, at the heart of which lie notions of a diverse identity.
  
American writers, when raising questions of identity, often use both plot and characters to explore and develop upon binary concepts. In Chopin’s ‘awakening’ of Edna Pontellier’s sexual and social identity, we as readers experience the dichotomy of conformation and dissidence to the social norm. Indeed ‘Edna is torn by the tension between what Chopin calls the ‘outward existence which conforms’ and the ‘inward life which questions’. Chopin, through Edna’s rebellious behaviour and outlook reveals the scandalous struggle in the late 19^th century between mind and body, freedom and suppression, and sexuality and abstention.

 
  Indeed, Edna Pontellier is stifled by the repressive 19^th century culture and challenges the identity forced upon her of wife and mother even telling Madame Ratignolle that ‘she would never sacrifice herself for her children, or for any one’. This statement remains even slightly scandalous by today’s standards. It is Edna’s disregard for the opinions of others which fuels her actions. Indeed ‘We cannot be certain whether her act stems from an impulse of the self to find affirmation beyond society’s reach, even at the expense of death, or more simply from some assent to dismissal from a world she cannot accept’. It is this ‘impulse of the self’ with which Chopin masterfully explores gender and sexual identity of a woman at the turn of the century. Edna is defiant in her behaviour, even selfish, in order to break free from the restrictive boundaries of her gender. 

        
      Furthermore it is impossible to ignore the unique blend of racial and ethnic cultures which exist in America today, many of which have had their origins immortalised in literature. It is these cultures and races which contribute to an identity of multiculturalism present in much of American fiction. This multicultural identity is what often enriches and brings to life the American novel. As well as the depiction of gender and sexual identity, Chopin, as a regionalist writer, explores the unique cultural identity of the French Creole community.  The inclusion of the French language within the narrative adds a sense of reality and sophisticated understanding to ‘The Awakening’. As Spiller asserts ‘she knew how to use dialect for flavouring; with her it never became an obstacle’; this is reminiscent of Mark Twain’s use of dialect in ’The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’. Chopin decorates both the omniscient narrative and the stylised speech of her characters with French dialogue; we are informed of how Edna ‘made no ineffectual efforts to conduct her household en bonne ménagèr’. Likewise we read Robert exclaim ‘with a sudden, boyish laugh, "Voilà que Madame Ratignolle est jalouse!". This realism in the portrayal of local customs, culture and speech embellishes Chopin’s characterisation and portrayal of Creole identity making it not only more believable to the reader, but simultaneously more interesting as a novel.
  

Indeed, truth as a necessity for a believable and thus more interesting depiction of life also applies in the pioneer fictions of Willa Cather. In these novels however, rather than truthful characterisation, it is more her sentimental depiction and humanization of the land, which evokes a powerful and even romantic sense of identity. Drawing upon ‘shapes and scenes that have teased the mind for years’ Cather believes that to construct sympathy from solely imagination ‘can at best present only a brilliant sham’. In many instances, questions of identity are intrinsically linked with the memory of the author. The best ideas and images are indeed those formed from imprints of sentimental memory long passed, rather than recent experiences and impressions.  It is these persistant memories, which have stood the test of time and linger fondly in the mind of the author, from which Cather drew her inspiration for the relatively plotless pioneer novels.
  Moreover Cather reveals an interplay between the human soul and it’s environment enriching the vast western prairie with its own character. In ‘My Antonia’ Cather describes the plough ‘magnified across the distance by the horizontal light’ of the sunset, standing  ‘black against the molten red. There it was, heroic in size, a picture writing on the sun’. This poignant imagery combines the idea of the beauty of nature and man-made factors which co-exist with it. Both the plough and the light of the sun are ‘heroic’ and their importance is reinforced by the powerful contrast of black against red. Indeed, in O pioneers! we read that the ‘great fact’ of prairie life, ‘was the land itself’. The multicultural identity which lies at the heart of the pioneer fictions is epitomised by imprints left upon the land by the masses of different cultural and ethnic identities. The pioneer fictions are stories of human toil, heart and soul which ‘go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before’. In this way Cather celebrates the historical origin of such a large part of American culture and identity today.

Oregon, August 1939. “Unemployed lumber worker goes with his wife to the bean harvest. Note Social Security number tattooed on arm.”

      Often, however, when exploring the origins of such multicultural identities, writers portray the more negative contrasts using the binary of the ‘civilized’ oppressor and the oppressed other. In this way, writers of American fiction have explored a loss of identity with the depiction of the diminished ethnic voice; whether it is that of the disappearing Native Indian narrator, chief Bromden, in ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest’, or the revealing  insights of the repressed African American offered in the slave narratives.  In these works we witness a juxtaposition to the American ideal of ‘the land of the free’. An austere contrast is indeed drawn when we consider Emma Lazarus’s  poem, engraved on the pedestal of the statue of liberty greeting immigrants at new York city harbour in 1903. ‘Give me your tired your poor/ your huddled masses yearning to breathe free (...) I lift my lamp beside the golden door!’ . This reassuringly poignant verse welcomes immigrants and other nationalities yet the bleak incongruous truth is, as literature and history have shown, ‘America has often not welcomed but instead erased differences of region, race, colour, creed, class or gender’
  Undeniably, we need look no further than Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs’ exposés which reveal the tragedy of inhumane repression of generations of African Americans ignorant of their roots.  As autobiographies, these narrative writers truly expose the pain and harsh truth of parts of America’s history. As Douglass writes we ‘were ranked with horses and men, cattle and women, pigs and children, all holding the same rank in the scale of being’. This stark description highlights the behaviour which reduced the individual identity of an African American, regardless of gender or age, into that of an animalistic slave. It is this loss of identity through oppressive forces, which left the white reader of the 19^th century and the modern reader truly sympathetic.
 

      Moreover, this loss of identity through oppression is a common theme explored in American fiction. The puritan identity, for example, explored by Hawthorne in ‘The Scarlet Letter’, is one of contrasts. Here Hawthorne presents the struggle between an identity of individualism weighed against the judgements of a social zeitgeist. The puritan identity is of the founding father; the dominant and authoritative white man imposing himself and his religious and moral assertations upon all around him. It is this puritan identity which forces itself upon the fragile yet very much self empowered identity of Hester Prynn. Hawthorne uses Hester’s sin of adultery to explore some of the age old human characteristics of frailty and sorrow. As Spiller writes ‘We watch the slow relentless fires of subsequent remorse and revenge sear them all’.  The puritan mechanisms themselves, such as the red letter ‘A’ embroidered upon Hester’s clothing are not inherent in the tragedy of Hester’s loss of identity.  They represent only the fashions of an era which may have their equivalent both in the society of Hawthorne’s reader, and that of ours. 

  Although Hester’s individual loss of a sense of personal identity is a focal point in the novel, Hawthorne reaffirms throughout her final self empowerment and redemption that the scarlet letter is in fact a symbol of adversity overcome and of knowledge gained. Indeed by the end of the novel Hawthorne informs us that ‘the scarlet letter ceased to be a stigma which attracted the world’s scorn and bitterness, and became a type of something to be sorrowed over, and looked upon with awe, and yet with reverence, too’.
  

 Similarly, just as significant as Hester Prynn’s triumph over a loss of identity is the search for a true identity explored by Kesey. The concept of a defiant quest for true identity is powerfully depicted in ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’ in which Kesey ‘‘explored the redemptive effects of individual rebellion; the edge of creative violence’’. McMurphy challenges authority in this novel through maintaining a psychological and personal identity. Unlike the other patients at the Oregon state mental hospital, McMurphy refuses to submit to the controlling nurse Ratched.  This exploration of identity is all the more powerfully resonant and poignant when understood alongside the literary culture in which Kesey was writing.  In 1960s America, American society, indeed culture itself was perceived as the dead weight of custom,  the repressive force of abstraction from which man must escape’  in which there surfaced ‘radical distrust of psycho therapy’. In this way Kesey uses ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’ to explore the ways in which man’s personal sense of identity can be repressed, through the stifling of individualism. It is a disturbing novel in which the reader is exposed to the identity of the mind. Nurse Ratched induces fear, not through obvious physical brutality or violence, but on the contrary, through the subtleties of her unsettling psychological manipulation of the very vulnerable male identities on her ward. As chief Bromden explains ‘As soon as you let down your guard, as soon as you lose once, she's won for good’. The imagery employed by Kesey of winning and losing reiterates the notion of a constant battle or struggle for these men searching for their sanity, or in other words their sense of identity.

In conclusion, the concept of identity in American literature is intrinsically linked with history.  American society and culture are rooted in the events of the past and these are often dramatised in very poignant ways. American writers use stark binary concepts, such as oppression and the oppressed, escapism and control and sanity and insanity to illustrates the complexities of the identity of the mind. Whether it is Edna Pontellier’s empowered female identity, or the beauty of the almost personified land, American writers use truth and sophisticated understanding of the people whom they describe to create the multi-diverse depiction of the American identity.

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