This listing is for Like Water for Chocolate VHS Video Tape PROMO Screener.
Actors: Marco Leonardi, Lumi Cavazos, Regina Torne, Mario Ivan MartÃnez, Ada Carrasco
Directors: Alfonso Arau
Writers: Laura Esquivel
Producers: Alfonso Arau, Emilia Arau, Oscar Castillo
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, NTSC, PROMO Screener Edition
Language: English, Spanish
Rated: R - Restricted
Number of tapes: 1
Studio: Walt Disney Video
VHS Release Date: January 9, 1996
Run Time: 105 minutes
This foreign film provides a convoluted plot that's quite engaging. Such films have a tendency to take this author back to his studies of film and foreign language at the same time at a major university in the 1960s where the number of films playing with subtitles was vast and set a very big change from the common fair at the local theaters. American audiences tend to shun "sub titles," but films of this genre provide opportunities for learning since often what is said is not what the sub titles relate. That concept was once again born out by this film, originally recorded in Spanish. One need not really speak the language to perceive the subtleties of word play and this author enjoys the euphonic intrigues as a major part of the film. This film is full of intrigues of all sorts.
The main character, Tita the youngest of three siblings, is a battered girl living on a ranch owed by a well-to-do family in Mexico. Filming was done in the state of Coahuila, Piedras Negras depicting the year 1895 forward for about forty years. During that time Tita grows up to rebel as do her sisters most notably Gertrudias who fought in the war of Independence. The recurring themes were rebellion while continuing to be female in every way.
A lot of time in the film is spent on feelings about being a woman whether with or without guilt. The main character has to overcome guilt and manages to do so very well. That realization comes about in argumentative vignettes with her deceased mother's apparition. Overcoming required female servitude becomes Tita's goal and she greatly succeeds in passing the freedom of self respect on to her niece Esperanza. Tita did not get to marry the person of her choice whereas her niece achieved that reality with her aunt's help and support. Tita's cooking, learned from a senior servant, is intertwined throughout the entire plot in a very quaint and interesting way. Women of those times were cooks and mothers and not much more. Even so, they held families together, made wonderful homes and made life tolerable for everyone with whom they came into contact. A person's life, no matter how simple, is something of great value. In the end, everyone has a limited amount of time on Earth. Children are born, people pass on and the past fades away. Such is life. This is a film to revisit. It leaves a wonderful feeling of love and peace.
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