GaeL with a Capital L
In Motorcycle Diaries, he was remarkable.
In Bad Education, he was simply divine!
He's my new fave guy, GAEL GARCIA BERNAL!
I'm not much of a fan of foreign language movies simply because subtitles distract me. Only if I get early reviews of really interesting films do I make an effort to watch them. And I'm sure glad I took time to watch Bad Education (La Mala Educacion)! It is a very engaging tale of love, deceit, sexual abuse, the Catholic Church, homosexuality . . . okay, I'm getting reduntant here . . . Kidding!
Well, it's my first time to watch an Almodovar-helmed movie and now I realized that the hype surrounding his greatness really has some merits. After all, he's supposed to be one of Madonna's favorite directors. Who are we to argue with that?!
But, the one who really stood out in this movie is definitely Gael. He inhabited the role of Ignacio/Angel so perfectly, you couldn't help but fall for him. AND there's nothing like seeing a man go in drag and still manage to exude raw sexual magnetism. And it's almost impossible for any actor to do a scene having to go down on a guy and go bottom, with his very manly appeal unscathed. In Bad Education, Gael pulled it off! Pardon the pun.
I look forward to seeing more of Gael's movies. I believe that given the right opportunities, he could be another Antonio Banderas. Only better.
To understand what I'm talking about, go check out his films yourselves. Visit your ever reliable 'video pirates' in your area and you may be lucky to get hold of a copy of any of his films. Believe me, you won't regret it!
Movies
2 comments:
Interesting...
Bad Education is really more of a provocative Gael Garcia Bernal. Pedro Almodovar could have chosen another actor and the result will be more or less the same. Gael's best works, so far, are as Che Guevarra in "Motorcycle Diaries" and as Octavio in Alejandro Inarritu's (another great director), "Amores Perros". Try finding these two movies. They're worth it.
I would much rather go to a "foreign movie" as they seem to have the most important part, the story itself, almost always much more interesting than anything that comes out of Hollywood. But really, these days, what is a "foreign movie"? Life's experiences are pretty much the same anywhere..except the impact is different when the dialogue is in Spanish or French or German or even Japanese. And sometimes, Merchant-Ivory films should be subtitled because it's really hard to understand those bloody English people!
P.S.
I went to the screening of Dolphy's "Markova" at last year's Asian Film Festival here in San Francisco. It was subtitled in English and my friend who went with me (100% Filipino and speaks better Tagalog than I do) was reading the subtitles!!! Like he couldn't understand any word spoken by the actors! Hahaha!!!
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