Madregilda

If you miss this flick, don´t worry. There´s nothing to loose.

This is a movie that sips its inspiration from the same fountain that director Emir Kusturica drank when the movie `Underground' (1995) was made. It´s a surrealistic flick with an impoverished artistic vein.

In the beginning it looks a lot like `Hope and Glory'(1987) by John Boorman, tough the other flick is MUCH better, as the story follows the steps of a young lad in a war-plagued Spain during the General Franco regime. All of a sudden the story changes, as if another somebody had changed a TV channel while you were watching it. The movie now depicts an insane, resentful, incompliant man, who happens to be one of the supporters of the totalitarian regime, as a member of the Military. The portrait of this man could be defined as a cry against totalitarian regimes, no matter what name they get. This man is also the father of the boy of the beginning of the movie, and the killer of her mother, in a jealously frenzy. There´s another subplot (is there a main plot in this?) involving the imaginary relation between the boy and his mother, but the scenes are interwoven in the Frankenstein way. The overall impression that this movie leaves on the viewer is that this could have been a good flick if a better director conducted the work of filmmaking.

I must be honest and tell that I had a hard time just staying awake, thanks to dull characters and dark photography.