El ley del deseo (1987, Pedro Almodóvar)

I saw most of Almodóvar's films last year, but then I was too lazy to make nots. The result is that now I confuse most of his films. I want to re-watch some of his films, at least as they become available to me.
Pablo (Eusebio Poncela) is in a kind of relationship with Juan (Miguel Molina, only a supporting role). Antonio (Antonio Banderas) gets infatuated with Pablo, they start a wild affair, but for Pablo it's only a physical thing. - Pablo has a transgender brother, who is now called Tina (Carmen Maura).
Antonio is developing a serious jealousy and kills Juan. - After an accident Pablo has temporarily amnesia and Antonio starts an affair with Tina.
And so on. This sounds like the plot of an opera or maybe rather a comic book, but still -- Almodóvar exaggerates, yes, but he also explores. He explores the boundaries of love. He explores where physical attraction transcends into lust and when lust becomes love. He explores how it feels to love somebody who only loves  to be loved. And he sketches how it feels how it feels when you realize that you will never be loved more than by the pers on whom you just have lost. Almodóvar uses a thick brush, his characters are on the extreme side of life, always trying to make most out of life.
Unfortunately this implies in many of his films the use of drugs. This is the one thing I really hate about his films, that many persons use drugs, that happiness is an artificial dream. We never see any damaging effect, only the anesthetic effect to blend out reality. Another recurrent theme is the Catholic Church. Tina used to be a chorus boy in a church and the priest remembers that boy very well. In Almodóvar's films priests are very often very fond of boys.
So, in spite of the melodramatic tendency in this film, I still like it. It may be one of Almodóvar's most personal films, maybe a film about himself (?), as he doesn't tell the story of a woman.
In short: anybody who ever loved passionately must be able to recognize something in this film. This does not look like a film that was shot 30 years ago.
9/10

Was this the inspiration for Desde allá?

Dubbing of an xxx-rated movie

Antonio - aiming from the beginning

Juan is off for summer holidays

Pablo and Juan had a good time

Women and cleaning - a chapter in the films of Almodóvar

This is what the fans of Antonio BAnderas were waiting for

Pablo and Antonio relax

Iconic scene!

Antonio meets his rival

The Lighthouse of Trafalgar

Antonio gets rid of evidence

Police is self-confident

A new triangle: Pablo, Antonio, Tita

Pablo will never again  be loved so passionately

Los ojos de Julia (Guillem Morales, 2010)

I let me fool again. This was produced by Guillermo del Toro. Obviously I still think that he can do something remarkably good, just because he has directed one decent film. I should become wiser, especially after the failure of Mamá (Andrés Muschietti, 2013). It was broadcast by our culture channel, so I had actually reason to believe that it was worth my time.
The subject of becoming blind should work as a scary one for me, but it didn't. Julia is investigating the apparent suicide of her sister. She feels that it could have been murder. Her husband supports her reluctantly. Julia has the same illness and will also lose her eyesight soon. Her husband tells her that stress will make her blind sooner. During the investigation people die randomly, but police does not really care to investigate. When Julia gets her eye operation, she insists to stay in the house of her dead sister. She has a day carer to look after her. Soon we find out that he has some unhealthy obsessions.
There is atmosphere and style in this film, but no captivating, let alone horrifying plot. Why would Julia insist to be away from professional care when something as essential as her eyesight is at stake? It is also confusing that Julia's sight temporarily returns (and disappears) to make the already thin plot work. Also power cuts occur randomly to make us fumble in the blind. The plot follows the usual devolpment of such stories - with the default suicide of the killer. Yawn.
It seems that this is the only film from Morales until now.
3/10

Los abrazos rotos (2009, Pedro Almodóvar)

The last weeks were almost like a long depression - stress at work with overall impact for the life I try to enjoy while not being at work. More receptive than active and thus my miserable blog became orphaned again. In addition I almost forgot what I watched and what I wanted to write about.
This movie, Broken Embraces, as it happens to be called in English, was already in the backlog. But now I am getting into the mood for Madrid, so I watched a lot of movies by Almodóvar. His manuscripts often resemble a graphic novel, or what the Italians might call a giallo. Bu t now I learned that Almodóvar is the heir of Span ish baroque comedies in the style of Lope de Vega. Hm, that is only a name to me - nothing more. Need to look for more.
From his output, this film most reminds me of his master piece Bad Education - a game of deception on several layers, handled with the virtuosity of a wizard who never leaves the viewer on his own. And he blends different genres brilliantly, so at the end there is a spicy gazpacho.
TBC

Seis puntos sobre Emma (2012)

This film by director Roberto Pérez Toledo was on Arte, which is a recommendation in its own right. There is virtually no information available on this film. It seems that the director is mainly known for short movies In a way this is a long short movie.
Emma (Verónica Echegui) is blind.She feels that she cannot fall in love, but she wants a child, as she feels that a kid might add meaning to her life. She is an independent women and uses men for her purposes. She attends meetings of a therapy group of people with different handicaps. She decided that the leader of this group (Alex García) should be the one who involuntarily begets that child. In the neighbor flat is Diego (Fernando Tielve) , who also gets infatuated with Emma and starts stalking her. He discovers that the therapist is married and that he also films their intercourses. Break and then she seeks comfort with Diego. - In the end she pregnant and moves away.

Alex García, a visual highlight of this film.

So in a trivial manner the plot could be summed up in this way: Emma is blind, but thinks that she sees clearly, but then she realizes that not only her vision is blurred. Not very intriguing.
Rating: 4/10
PROJECT: See the films completely you didn't watch the first time, because you fell asleep during first viewing.

Emma should pick her psycho therapist.

Map of the Sounds of Tokyo (2009)

Mapa de los sonidos de Tokyo (2009) - ein Film von Isabel Coixet.
So, dann will ich doch mal notieren, dass ich diesen Film gesehen habe. Wenn man dem Kulturbegriff des ZDFs folgt, trifft man gelegentlich auf seltsame Blüten, so wie hier. Eine Fischhändlerin, die gelegentlich als Auftragskillerin arbeitet und einen spanischen Weinhändler töten soll, weil ein Firmenchef ihn für den Suizid seiner Tochter verantwortlich macht. Banalerweise verlieben die beiden sich, die Killerin und sein Opfer, o jerum.
Ja gut, der Film hat poetische Bilder; die Geräusche, die Tokyo macht, sind vielleicht nicht so eindrucksvoll, sondern eher vulgär.
Ein Film, den Intellektuelle unter sich genießen und hervorragend finden können, bei mir gab's nur 4/10.