Review by Raymond Murray
By: Raymond Murray
In-House Review - May 16 2014
Lovers of Pedro Almodóvar's outrageous style will find this delirious comedy a pure delight. A released mental patient (Antonio Banderas) kidnaps a addicted porn star (Victoria Abril) and professes his love for her. Surprisingly sentimental fo...
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Lovers of Pedro Almodóvar's outrageous style will find this delirious comedy a pure delight. A released mental patient (Antonio Banderas) kidnaps a addicted porn star (Victoria Abril) and professes his love for her. Surprisingly sentimental for Almodóvar, this is an often hilarious tale of love and bondage which features a truly steamy sex scene and a water toy with a penchant for swimming into the nether regions of the female anatomy.
Review by Raymond Murray
By: Raymond Murray
In-House Review - May 16 2014
Lovers of Pedro Almodóvar's outrageous style will find this delirious comedy a pure delight. A released mental patient (Antonio Banderas) kidnaps a addicted porn star (Victoria Abril) and professes his love for her. Surprisingly sentimental fo...
Read More
Lovers of Pedro Almodóvar's outrageous style will find this delirious comedy a pure delight. A released mental patient (Antonio Banderas) kidnaps a addicted porn star (Victoria Abril) and professes his love for her. Surprisingly sentimental for Almodóvar, this is an often hilarious tale of love and bondage which features a truly steamy sex scene and a water toy with a penchant for swimming into the nether regions of the female anatomy.
Review by Amos Lassen
By: Amos Lassen
Pedro Almodovar pays tribute to Stockholm syndrome in "Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!" a rambunctious dark comedy stars Antonio Banderas and Victoria Abril. Banderas plays Ricky, an unbalanced but alluring former mental patient and Abril is Marina, the B-mo...
Read More
Pedro Almodovar pays tribute to Stockholm syndrome in "Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!" a rambunctious dark comedy stars Antonio Banderas and Victoria Abril. Banderas plays Ricky, an unbalanced but alluring former mental patient and Abril is Marina, the B-movie and porn star he takes prisoner in the hopes of convincing her to marry him.
When asylum authorities release Ricky, he proceeds to demonstrate the error of their decision. He goes to the set of film director Maximo Espejo (Francisco Rabal), a wheelchair-bound lecher whose current Euro-horror film is about a hideously , masked muscleman. Ricky's an enamored fan of Marina (Victoria Abril), a porn star recovering from addiction by appearing in a 'straight' genre film. Ricky met and bedded her briefly on a previous escape from the hospital. He is sure that he holds the solution to all her problems and kidnaps her, locks her in her apartment and sets out to prove that his love transcends simple fan adoration. His formula for romantic success is bondage and tender loving care in equal doses. Marina does not know how to take this and her is unpredictable.
This is Almodóvar's take on human relationships that is totally original and he uses his own technique to show it to us. Marina is a confused, disordered, irresponsible spirit who does indeed need to be tied down long enough to realize that mutual romance is a possibility. Her terror as a captive does indeed turn into something else the more time she shares with Ricky, and after a few days watching him stare at her in total devotion. Americans seem to believe that we invented liberated thought and feminine equality and we see here how ridiculous that is. We also see that relationships can be just about anything, even if totally traditional in the man dominates and the woman submits. As obnoxious as this seems to progressive feminist activism, it's been the way of the world for so long that man will have to do a lot more evolving before it goes away entirely. Marina and Ricky are characters and not real people. She's not particularly bright and he's practically a moron. We see them as comedic characters with their love for each other developing in an outrageous series of oddball comedy moments, some of which need to be thought about to decide whose if Almodóvar is playing with us. However, he does remind us that this is all fantasy.
It is funny, well acted, and bizarre as only an Almodóvar film can be. Stockholm Syndrome is a funny thing and Almodovar tries to tease out its roots and strange perversity in this film. Stockholm syndrome, by the way, is what happens when a victim of a begins to identify with their captors. Ricky manages to entrap Marina in her own apartment after her film's shoot is over wrapped and he slowly and carefully explains how's he's come to help straighten her out and be a good, devoted husband. They'll soon be very happy with their two or three kids. She just needs to understand this. Because Marina is indeed a flawed person, her personality becomes easier to repress the closer she returns to her addictive nature. Throughout the film, she pushes Banderas to get her the she needs to overcome the pain, which, considering her former addictions, grow more and more illicit. By the time Banderas is beaten for an attempt to get her actual , he's gone from being her kidnapper to her enabler. She realizes this, and begins to reciprocate his affections, perhaps even more aggressively than he'd prefer. However, every time he leaves her alone, he must tie her up to make sure she does not run away. As their relationship grows more complex, it's obvious that the bonds aren't necessary, and by the end, she's tying herself up. We never go so far as for the bondage to physically occur during the lovemaking scenes, but by that point the bonds begin to take on a more metaphysical nature-- he controls her, she accepts it and gives herself freely.
"Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!" has an NC-17 rating because there are some intense scenes of lovemaking and a bit of violence, but the undercurrents aren't anything I can imagine anyone under a certain age understanding and dealing with. This is an adult film but it is also a smart and clever film.
The Criterion special features include:
Digitally remastered: New 2K digital restoration, supervised by director Pedro Almodóvar and executive producer Agustín Almodóvar, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack on the Blu-ray
Documentaries: New documentary on the making of the film including interviews with Pedro and Agustín Almodóvar; actors Antonio Banderas, Victoria Abril, Loles Léon, Rossy de Palma, and Penélope Cruz; production manager Esther García; editor José Salcedo; and cinematographer José Luis Alcaine
Interview(s): New interview with Almodóvar collaborator and Sony Pictures Classics co president Michael Barker
Interview(s): Conversation from 2003 between Almodóvar and Banderas
Bonus footage: Footage from the film's 1990 premieres in Madrid and New York
New English subtitle translation
Booklet: A booklet featuring a 1990 piece about the film by Almodóvar, a conversation between filmmaker Wes Anderson and critic Kent Jones, and an interview with Almodóvar from 1989.
Review by Amos Lassen
By: Amos Lassen
Pedro Almodovar pays tribute to Stockholm syndrome in "Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!" a rambunctious dark comedy stars Antonio Banderas and Victoria Abril. Banderas plays Ricky, an unbalanced but alluring former mental patient and Abril is Marina, the B-mo...
Read More
Pedro Almodovar pays tribute to Stockholm syndrome in "Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!" a rambunctious dark comedy stars Antonio Banderas and Victoria Abril. Banderas plays Ricky, an unbalanced but alluring former mental patient and Abril is Marina, the B-movie and porn star he takes prisoner in the hopes of convincing her to marry him.
When asylum authorities release Ricky, he proceeds to demonstrate the error of their decision. He goes to the set of film director Maximo Espejo (Francisco Rabal), a wheelchair-bound lecher whose current Euro-horror film is about a hideously , masked muscleman. Ricky's an enamored fan of Marina (Victoria Abril), a porn star recovering from addiction by appearing in a 'straight' genre film. Ricky met and bedded her briefly on a previous escape from the hospital. He is sure that he holds the solution to all her problems and kidnaps her, locks her in her apartment and sets out to prove that his love transcends simple fan adoration. His formula for romantic success is bondage and tender loving care in equal doses. Marina does not know how to take this and her is unpredictable.
This is Almodóvar's take on human relationships that is totally original and he uses his own technique to show it to us. Marina is a confused, disordered, irresponsible spirit who does indeed need to be tied down long enough to realize that mutual romance is a possibility. Her terror as a captive does indeed turn into something else the more time she shares with Ricky, and after a few days watching him stare at her in total devotion. Americans seem to believe that we invented liberated thought and feminine equality and we see here how ridiculous that is. We also see that relationships can be just about anything, even if totally traditional in the man dominates and the woman submits. As obnoxious as this seems to progressive feminist activism, it's been the way of the world for so long that man will have to do a lot more evolving before it goes away entirely. Marina and Ricky are characters and not real people. She's not particularly bright and he's practically a moron. We see them as comedic characters with their love for each other developing in an outrageous series of oddball comedy moments, some of which need to be thought about to decide whose if Almodóvar is playing with us. However, he does remind us that this is all fantasy.
It is funny, well acted, and bizarre as only an Almodóvar film can be. Stockholm Syndrome is a funny thing and Almodovar tries to tease out its roots and strange perversity in this film. Stockholm syndrome, by the way, is what happens when a victim of a begins to identify with their captors. Ricky manages to entrap Marina in her own apartment after her film's shoot is over wrapped and he slowly and carefully explains how's he's come to help straighten her out and be a good, devoted husband. They'll soon be very happy with their two or three kids. She just needs to understand this. Because Marina is indeed a flawed person, her personality becomes easier to repress the closer she returns to her addictive nature. Throughout the film, she pushes Banderas to get her the she needs to overcome the pain, which, considering her former addictions, grow more and more illicit. By the time Banderas is beaten for an attempt to get her actual , he's gone from being her kidnapper to her enabler. She realizes this, and begins to reciprocate his affections, perhaps even more aggressively than he'd prefer. However, every time he leaves her alone, he must tie her up to make sure she does not run away. As their relationship grows more complex, it's obvious that the bonds aren't necessary, and by the end, she's tying herself up. We never go so far as for the bondage to physically occur during the lovemaking scenes, but by that point the bonds begin to take on a more metaphysical nature-- he controls her, she accepts it and gives herself freely.
"Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!" has an NC-17 rating because there are some intense scenes of lovemaking and a bit of violence, but the undercurrents aren't anything I can imagine anyone under a certain age understanding and dealing with. This is an adult film but it is also a smart and clever film.
The Criterion special features include:
Digitally remastered: New 2K digital restoration, supervised by director Pedro Almodóvar and executive producer Agustín Almodóvar, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack on the Blu-ray
Documentaries: New documentary on the making of the film including interviews with Pedro and Agustín Almodóvar; actors Antonio Banderas, Victoria Abril, Loles Léon, Rossy de Palma, and Penélope Cruz; production manager Esther García; editor José Salcedo; and cinematographer José Luis Alcaine
Interview(s): New interview with Almodóvar collaborator and Sony Pictures Classics co president Michael Barker
Interview(s): Conversation from 2003 between Almodóvar and Banderas
Bonus footage: Footage from the film's 1990 premieres in Madrid and New York
New English subtitle translation
Booklet: A booklet featuring a 1990 piece about the film by Almodóvar, a conversation between filmmaker Wes Anderson and critic Kent Jones, and an interview with Almodóvar from 1989.