VOLVER
(2006)
© 2006 by C. E. Murphy. All Rights Reserved.
L to R: Carmen Maura as Abuela Irene
and Penélope Cruz as Raimunda
in Volver
Directed by Pedro Almodóvar, Spain

Photo Credit: Sony Pictures Classics
© 2006

    Pedro Almodóvar has been a favorite of the programmers at the New York
Film Festival for some time, so it comes as no surprise that the centerpiece
of the 2006 edition was his latest effort, VOLVER. His title is taken from a
popular Spanish tango and the English translation is roughly "to return" or
"coming back" and that is how the director sees this picture, as a return to
the sort of films he used to make. While that's not entirely the case -- yes,
VOLVER does contain elements of many of the filmmaker's earlier works --
it is still the work of a more mature artist.

    The film begins mournfully as we see black-clad women cleaning the
graves of their loved ones in a cemetery. The film's heroine Raimunda (a
luminous Penélope Cruz) and her sister Sole (Lola Dueñas) are tending to
the gravesite of their parents. Afterwards, along with Raimunda's teenage
daughter (Yohana Cobo), they visit with their aging aunt Paula (Chus
Lampreave), who appears frail and suffering from dementia. Aunt Paula speaks
of having seen the girls' mother Irene (Carmen Maura), who later "appears"
to Sole.

    The plot grows thicker with Almodóvar's typical mixture of genres from
comedy to film noir to melodrama. As he has proven in the past, the director
is perhaps one of the best living movie makers who has a true appreciation
for actresses. Each of the females in the cast deliver sterling performances.
And yet ... I don't know if it was the pre-screening hype or just my high
expectations, but I left the film feeling a bit unimpressed. I have felt this way
before watching an Almodóvar film and subsequent viewings of the film years
later have often altered my views. I suspect if I look at VOLVER again in
several years, it will be the same thing. To my mind, he failed to make his
themes -- particularly "reconciliation" -- clear and coherent. The strands are
there in the plot; they just don't weave together tightly.

      In many ways, Almodóvar seems stuck as a writer and director. He
often recycles pieces of prior films and in most of his oeuvre, at least one
character returns to the village of his or her youth. Now he's utilized that
theme as the basis for an entire film -- a good one, but not a great one.
Maybe it's time to try something different.

               Rating:                B
               Running time:     120 mins.
               MPAA rating:       R for some sexual content and language