Thursday, February 19, 2009

Spanish film Sex and Lucia

Sex and Lucia (Lucía y el sexo; lit. Lucía and the Sex) is an award winning 2001 Spanish drama film, written and directed by Julio Medem, and starring Paz Vega and Tristán Ulloa. As suggested by the title, there is significant sexual content. The movie features a highly a non-linear story line with repeated surreal references to the ocean.
Story
The movie opens with Lorenzo (Tristán Ulloa) having casual sex in the ocean with a woman named Elena (Najwa Nimri). They part ways, expecting to never see each other again.
The next scene has Lucía (Paz Vega) at work as a waitress, taking time off to attend to Lorenzo after a disconcerting phone call with him. Upon arriving home, Lucía looks frantically for Lorenzo, finally receiving a phone call from the police who mention that Lorenzo has been involved in a car accident. Looking for perspective, Lucía decides to travel to the mysterious island where Elena and Lorenzo met.
The movie breaks to six years earlier. Lucía waits for Lorenzo at a restaurant. Upon catching his attention, she reveals curtly that since reading his book she has been shadowing him, hopelessly in love. An interested Lorenzo pursues the relationship. As the past plays out, we see Lorenzo repeatedly stalling for time on his new book to his editor while Lorenzo and Lucía's relationship deepens. Lorenzo learns that he has a daughter as a result of his encounter with Elena and begins to visit the child at her school while meeting her babysitter Belén (Elena Anaya). Lorenzo uses his new encounters as content for his book. Lucía reads it, thinking it to be fiction.
In the present, Lucía meets a scuba diver on the island, Carlos (Daniel Freire), and through him, Elena, who becomes her landlady. As the past is revealed the characters cope with its significance in the present and understand the entanglements of their interwoven relationships.











No comments: