I can understand why people might enjoy or be intrigued by ‘Dark Habits’ but for me it’s not so much an achievement in itself, than a suggestion of what distinctive creativity was to come from its director, Pedro Almodovar.
Focusing on a group of unconventional nuns, Almodovar is able to stir up his usual controversy, as well as establishing some trademarks that would feature throughout his career, such as an almost all female cast; religion mixed with drugs and sex; transgenderism; and cheesy Spanish pop music. All combine to make a film that is highly stylised, distinctive and unmistakably Almodovar.
The controversy is fairly obvious and almost immature. The Mother Superior is a lesbian heroin addict; Sister Manure constantly takes acid; Sister Damned keeps a caged tiger; and Sister Rat writes trash novels. They all share a fetish for the desperate and destitute. We are introduced to their world by a nightclub singer on the run after her boyfriend has died from a heroin overdose. She finds shelter in the convent, coinciding with the nuns’ increasing financial difficulties and desperate measures to maintain their lifestyle.
The story is sparse and the various characters struggle to overcome the absurd situation they find themselves in to establish depth and meaning beyond fulfilling a narrative function. The extreme world they inhabit also prevents any significant identification with any character, or sympathy for the increasingly vulgar steps they take. Having said that, it’s fairly entertaining with some moments of comedy and interesting performances from future staples of Almodovar’s company – Carmen Maura, Marisa Peredes, Cecilia Roth.
There's an entertaining pop performance, that's extremely camped up with a trio of nuns miming along to the backing vocals and pretending to play instruments, but this feels tacked on to the main narrative which revolves around the mother superior's attempts to gain finances from their ex-benefactor (whose daughter became a nun before going to Africa and being eaten by cannibals), to continue to support their drug habits and self-denigrating lifestyle. Even this main narrative doesn't have much weight to it and I felt a bit of a "so what?" when following the action.
On the whole, the film kind of washed over me. It was imaginative but lacked substance, unlike his later ‘All About My Mother’, which I find fantastic, and ‘Talk To Her’ and ‘Volver’, which are both great. I’d recommend the earliest Almodovar you begin with be ‘The Flower Of My Secret’.
No comments:
Post a Comment