Kiss of the Spider Woman is an intriguing, slow-burning and involving piece that looks at friendships and relationships between two people thrust into a pretty desperate situation. The scenario is agonising; the setting is dirty and down-trodden while beyond that is the vast, run-down and poor locale of South America which, if you're characters in this film, would see it safer to be locked inside a prison than be out on the public streets all alone. Kiss of the Spider Woman is a battle of words; a representation of wills and resilience as two people you'd never catch a glimpse of together ordinarily, are thrust together in a jail cell with cramped conditions the order of the day.
The film, making the viewer aware of its theatrical links on many-a occasion given its tone and overall feel, begins with a long and thoroughly descriptive monologue about a woman from a film. The audience are plunged into a game of sorts; Kiss of the Spider Woman, being a piece bordering on the high art, has one of its characters engage in a lengthly description of something we come to learn isn't actually real and is actually discarded half way through. It is something the characters within this piece come to discuss and disregard themselves, one labelling it nothing more than a propaganda piece while the other being taken a-back by its warmth and romanticised nature. The inclusion of the fake film is some sort of ingredient linked to oppositional reading, that is to say how two very different people can read into the same thing differently. Kiss of the Spider Woman as an overall piece might be read into as a very basic prison drama, with all the necessary conventions found within the genre to do with honour and retribution. Then again, it might be read into as a study about the sorts of people on the outskirts of society, and how their own struggles in this film is an allegory for both real-life acceptance and peace given their chosen way of life.
Take the two leads. Their mindsets, attitudes and overall summary on what sorts of people they are is put across in a very basic, but very effective manner, linked to their bodies. Valentin Arregui (Juila) is a political prisoner; he's sweaty, rough, unshaven and well built. His cell mate is William Hurt's Luis Molina: an effeminate, shaven, thin and softly spoken cross dressing homosexual; someone that basks in the glory of being able to recite meaty descriptions of old romance films they've seen many-a time; the sorts of films that come across as silly to some but glorious in their themes, ideas and content to others. Then consider the plot point that becomes apparent towards the middle part of Kiss of the Spider Woman, and how all is not what it seems and how easy it would be to demonise certain 'types' of people as nasty, deceiving types that come across as one thing but are actually just after some vital information you might know of. Consider how on one hand you might see this second act twist as a rendering of those of a certain 'type' the enemy; and how the film fleshes out its 'enemy', turning them into mournful and regretful figures whom later come to act on their own.
But certain characters' epiphanies and their will to stand up against the authoritative figures and do what they deem 'just', not through mere principal born out of the fact they don't want to feel like they've been used, but because they have constructed within themselves genuine friendships; is much further on down the line. I'm drawn to Molina's sporadic, but lengthy when spoken of, recollection of the old film he so loves. Rather than just act as a physical example how oppositional reading can exist within texts (or texts within texts in this case), Molina's flagging up of this old tale is an allegory for the two men's own predicament; a living under strict and condensed conditions, in which repressed people want to fight and survive but's it's a Hell of a struggle. Given Molina's film sees a group of people in Wartime Europe get by under Nazi rule, the parallels are obvious.
Other than this; the film is concerned with the truly finer things in a friendship, or bond, or period of unity such as the one explored. Arregui's stomach pains that arise and the theories as to why that would even happen as well as the aiding of these pains progresses the two as this intimate process is carried out. Arregui also reveals the sensation that he once had a female partner who 'got away', before further telling us of another one out there waiting for him. This is a dramatic unfolding of events, as suddenly and jarringly, it gives the audience ammunition to want him to survive the film – something is suddenly at stake, and his well-being as well as happiness lies at the end of this journey if only he can get through.
Kiss of the Spider Woman is an interesting prison drama, the sort that doesn't really allow its characters to be free even if they have ventured outside of the prison, or indeed the prison cell. The acting is flawless across the board, with bodily binary oppositions Julia and Hurt feeding off of one another as these different sorts of people attempt to mingle and 'stand' each another. The film is more interested in the feelings of honour and guilt that comes with the sort of scenario the two shared, with particular attention to the crass revelation of one before they themselves dare to defy what they mustn't. As a brooding and evolving character piece, the production works.
The film, making the viewer aware of its theatrical links on many-a occasion given its tone and overall feel, begins with a long and thoroughly descriptive monologue about a woman from a film. The audience are plunged into a game of sorts; Kiss of the Spider Woman, being a piece bordering on the high art, has one of its characters engage in a lengthly description of something we come to learn isn't actually real and is actually discarded half way through. It is something the characters within this piece come to discuss and disregard themselves, one labelling it nothing more than a propaganda piece while the other being taken a-back by its warmth and romanticised nature. The inclusion of the fake film is some sort of ingredient linked to oppositional reading, that is to say how two very different people can read into the same thing differently. Kiss of the Spider Woman as an overall piece might be read into as a very basic prison drama, with all the necessary conventions found within the genre to do with honour and retribution. Then again, it might be read into as a study about the sorts of people on the outskirts of society, and how their own struggles in this film is an allegory for both real-life acceptance and peace given their chosen way of life.
Take the two leads. Their mindsets, attitudes and overall summary on what sorts of people they are is put across in a very basic, but very effective manner, linked to their bodies. Valentin Arregui (Juila) is a political prisoner; he's sweaty, rough, unshaven and well built. His cell mate is William Hurt's Luis Molina: an effeminate, shaven, thin and softly spoken cross dressing homosexual; someone that basks in the glory of being able to recite meaty descriptions of old romance films they've seen many-a time; the sorts of films that come across as silly to some but glorious in their themes, ideas and content to others. Then consider the plot point that becomes apparent towards the middle part of Kiss of the Spider Woman, and how all is not what it seems and how easy it would be to demonise certain 'types' of people as nasty, deceiving types that come across as one thing but are actually just after some vital information you might know of. Consider how on one hand you might see this second act twist as a rendering of those of a certain 'type' the enemy; and how the film fleshes out its 'enemy', turning them into mournful and regretful figures whom later come to act on their own.
But certain characters' epiphanies and their will to stand up against the authoritative figures and do what they deem 'just', not through mere principal born out of the fact they don't want to feel like they've been used, but because they have constructed within themselves genuine friendships; is much further on down the line. I'm drawn to Molina's sporadic, but lengthy when spoken of, recollection of the old film he so loves. Rather than just act as a physical example how oppositional reading can exist within texts (or texts within texts in this case), Molina's flagging up of this old tale is an allegory for the two men's own predicament; a living under strict and condensed conditions, in which repressed people want to fight and survive but's it's a Hell of a struggle. Given Molina's film sees a group of people in Wartime Europe get by under Nazi rule, the parallels are obvious.
Other than this; the film is concerned with the truly finer things in a friendship, or bond, or period of unity such as the one explored. Arregui's stomach pains that arise and the theories as to why that would even happen as well as the aiding of these pains progresses the two as this intimate process is carried out. Arregui also reveals the sensation that he once had a female partner who 'got away', before further telling us of another one out there waiting for him. This is a dramatic unfolding of events, as suddenly and jarringly, it gives the audience ammunition to want him to survive the film – something is suddenly at stake, and his well-being as well as happiness lies at the end of this journey if only he can get through.
Kiss of the Spider Woman is an interesting prison drama, the sort that doesn't really allow its characters to be free even if they have ventured outside of the prison, or indeed the prison cell. The acting is flawless across the board, with bodily binary oppositions Julia and Hurt feeding off of one another as these different sorts of people attempt to mingle and 'stand' each another. The film is more interested in the feelings of honour and guilt that comes with the sort of scenario the two shared, with particular attention to the crass revelation of one before they themselves dare to defy what they mustn't. As a brooding and evolving character piece, the production works.