Caresses

 

Picture: C+     Sound: C+     Extras: D     Film: C+

 

 

Ventura Pons attempts to weave more multiple storylines into a single film with Caresses, his 1996 drama that is sexually bold as What’s It All About (reviewed elsewhere on this site), but with much less humor.  Here, the characters are not sectioned off into vignettes, but co-exist in the same city.  They are all characters that are abusive, abused, confused, and emotionally isolated.

 

The title is meant ironically, as any physical contact is pointless, destructive, self destructive, or does not get any help, healing, or message across form one character to another.  Of the eleven stories (sort of) weaved together, the three standouts are about the guy (Sergi Lopez) who drifts through life unhappy and unable to connect, especially to women, the shockingly dysfunctional couple who are physically and verbally abusive to each other (which never makes sense or is convincing), and the teenager who becomes a hustler for personally damaged reasons.

 

That last one is the big shocker, offering two scenes that are especially bold.  The boy lives with is parents, who have no idea what he is doing.  He gives money to his bewildered mother, while feeling unconnected to his father.  When his father visits him in the bathroom as he bathes, they fight, the father eventually lands up in the bathtub with him, and the conversation and result shows the son’s insecurity about his body (unfounded) and manhood.  This contrasts with the scene where he is with an older man having rent-boy sex.  We have to wonder if the boy may have even been abused by, if not his father, someone else briefly.  Otherwise, it is an issue of sexuality crisis, and this film is not shy about this or having him nude.

 

It may be arguable that director Ventura Pons gets too distracted by this, at the cost of the film, though this is only addressed in sections.  There is a story to be told here, but the film is too busy with its other stories that none of them get the time they really need.  If it had been about the three noted, this would have been more up to What’s It All About.  I know the rent boy storyline would get this film an NC-17 just in nudity and theme in the U.S., though not as graphic as that rating would suggest, this is at least a very hard R.  This is Todd Solondz territory.

 

The letterboxed 1.85 X 1 image is above average, with the lack of anamorphic enhancement holding back the impressive cinematography of Jesus Escosa somewhat, but it is still sharper than lesser video formats.  Note how unusually the night sequences are covered.  The Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo decodes into Pro Logic surround well, but is not what it should be for 1996, even for a film so dialogue-based.  This shows in the music, what there is of it.  The DVD has no extras, except a trailer after the film.

 

I give Pons credit for taking risks, but for all the freedom he allows himself, so much feels unresolved.  Though there are no easy answers and a film that makes you think should not try (or over try) to give answers, Caresses is worth a look at best as an interesting non-success.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo