nycritic Pedro Almodovar seems to be aiming for the excesses of female drama even in his future explorations of male passion, seen in films like CARNE TREMULA (LIVE FLESH) and LA MALA EDUCACION (BAD EDUCATION). A hybrid caught between his lurid comedies of the Eighties and the darker, more textured dramas that would present him in a more mature light after the success of LA FLOR DE MI SECRETO (THE FLOWER OF MY SECRET), TACONES LEJANOS (HIGH HEELS) finds Almodovar continuing to explore the female psyche in a story that's an equivalent of a spicy gazpacho made with combinations of the histrionics of Joan Crawford in MILDRED PIERCE and the melodramatic garishness of a Douglas Sirk melodrama with a subtle reference to Ingmar Bergman's HOSTONATEN. Throw in the usual suspects -- a mother (with a name that recalls high-drag), Becky del Paramo (Marisa Paredes), her estranged daughter Rebeca (Victoria Abril), Rebeca's husband Manuel (Feodor Atkine) who is one of Becky's former lovers -- a little murder and a female impersonator (Miguel Bose), and you have a sizzling story that is vintage Almodovar.

melvelvit-1 Generally considered "lesser Almodovar" by many writer/critics, "Tacones Lejanos" is, in fact, one of the director's most stunning works. This film's true themes/motif pays tribute to "Golden Age Hollywood" and it's mythic lore. Aldomovar deliberately crafted this film as "homage" to Douglas Sirk's "Imitation Of Life" and, more importantly, it's star -Lana Turner."Douglas Sirk's celebrated maternal melodrama "Imitation Of Life" also begins with a child lost at a holiday location... And the multiple parallels between the two plots are clear: both focus on the life of a mother-performer, on maternal neglect, mother-daughter strife, and incestuous rivalry over a man: in "Tacones Lejanos" Rebeca will marry Becky's ex-lover. And in the murder of a male lover shared by two women, Almodovar may also be drawing on press accounts of Turner's real-life drama which, famously and ambiguously, fed into one of her most commercially successful screen roles. When Almodovar has Rebeca tell Becky "stop acting, mother!", he is signaling a quite explicit reference to "Imitation Of Life".When Victoria Abril's Rebeca opens her handbag, Almodovar cuts to a loving close-up of its Chanel label. English-language critics have used this attention to costume and detail to attack the supposed triviality of "Tacones Lejanos", obsessed as it would appear to be with accessories. Almodovar is paying homage here to a Hollywood tradition. The production notes for "Imitation Of Life" also stress the importance of Lana Turner's gowns and jewels, valued at over a million dollars.At first sight, however, Almodovar seems merely to have retained and intensified Sirk's formalism while jettisoning his broader concerns but... Aldomovar is insistent on the lack of irony in Sirk's films; curiously so when Sirk himself and most modern critics take ironic distance to be his most characteristic response to the melodramatic material he handled so skilfully." (From: "Critical Studies in Latin American and Iberian Cultures- Desire Unlimited, The Cinema of Pedro Almodovar") "La Lana" Turner was many things to many people- but here's the "self-referencial" in Madame's "Trash Yourself" oeuvre that Almodovar pays tribute to: LANA TURNER: The Lady & The Legend- "She started in Andy Hardy kid's stuff but soon dazzled audiences in films like "Ziegfeld Girl" & "Johnny Eager". As a top WW II pin-up girl, she inspired many a man to come back home to Mama. After the war, MGM turned up the heat, transitioning her to full-on glamorous movie star in films like "The Postman Always Rings Twice" & "The Bad And The Beautiful".In 1958, Lana picked a real doozie (of a lover): small-time hood and big-time ladies' man, Johnny Stompanato, a henchman for mobster Mickey Cohen. On April 4, (her daughter) Cheryl, 14, was home from school, lucky for Lana. Johnny slapped Lana and told her ...he'd ruin her face so she'd never work again. Cheryl, hearing everything outside the bedroom door, ran downstairs, terrified, and grabbed a kitchen knife...When a movie star is involved in a crime, the last person they want to see is a cop ..."Attorney to the stars" Jerry Geisler rushed to Bedford Drive. Some say Johnny was still alive and Geisler let him bleed out. The rumor that won't die is that Lana killed Johnny and Geisler convinced her to let Cheryl, a minor, take the fall. The next day the world heard the news...The press build-up was pure Hollywood: Stompanato's funeral; Turner's insistence that he was an unwelcome presence in her life; his brother's announcement that Johnny was stabbed lying down. The coup de grace came two days before the inquest when "Lanita's" love letters to her Johnny, filled with burning desires, were plastered across front pages worldwide -a little payback from Mickey Cohen, Stompanato's pal.Geisler got Cheryl excused from the inquest and that made Lana the star of the show. And what a show. The morning of the inquest, as hundreds of fans gathered downtown, Lana's make-up and hair people were giving her the works...She entered that courtroom "camera ready" for the greatest performance of her life. In the hushed, sweltering L.A. courtroom, Lana Turner breathlessly explained how her teenage daughter came to murder her gangster boyfriend.Only the clicking of cameras could be heard during Turner's anguished 62 minute testimony... The hearing lasted three hours. The jury returned a verdict in less than 20 minutes: justifiable homicide. Mickey Cohen griped to the press, "It's the first time in my life I've ever seen a dead man convicted of his own murder. So far as that jury was concerned, Johnny just walked too close to that knife." So go figure.After all the negative publicity, Lana's career was barely affected. As the 50's neared a close ...the public created the happy ending they needed to see.And the world had one less cheap hood in it.And Lana Turner would carry on... and continued to star in films of the 60's ...two of which, "Imitation Of Life" & "Madam X", drew shamelessly on her real-life troubles.P.S. the public loved them." (condensed from an article by Laurie Jacobson.) "Life With Lana": Three generations of women lived together, on and off, for a long time. Both "Lanita" and her mother were big-league drinkers and would "go at it" at the dining room table while little Cheryl looked on. Often, diamond rings, bracelets and invective slashed the air as dinner plates flew- "Don't EVER forget who pays the bills around here -and if you don't like anything I do ...you can GET OUT!" Impotent and powerless, respectively, against that force of Nature, "La Lana" -they shut up and ate their din-din.This family dynamic (and it's consequences) is played out in variation to devastating effect in the Aldomovar film.HIGHLY recommended as a double-feature with the Sirk/Turner opus!

PENDANT Do you have one singular childhood memory that would seem insignificant to the rest of the world? Rebeca does and it has defined her life of trying to be somebody that her famous mother will notice.Rebeca and Becky's final realization of each other's own self finally comes in the unselfish gesture that defines motherhood -- sacrifice.Although this movie is listed as a drama, the madness surrounding most of Almodovar leading ladies is ever present. Raunchy and racy, as well as tender and sweet, this movie is well worth the look if you can find it.

Michalo An interesting mystery plot that is made a special film due to Almodovar's unique style of directing, his obsessions, his actresses and, maybe, above all the music investment.A District Attorney who performs queen-shows, a daughter in the shade of her mother's glory, a mother under the pressure of her own glory, both involved with the same man (who is involved with other women as well), a different aspect of the TV and a different use of the TV-set. In addition two incredible songs "Un ano de amor" and "Piensa en mi".