Review of Pepi Luci Bom

Almodovar's first film, and obviously intended to be shocking and obscene. It's a bit shapeless, with some scenes and characters that appear to have been spliced in without any connection to the main plot or the rest of the characters. The story is about three women, one (Pepi) youngish and sort of glamorous, one (Luci) middle-aged, petite bourgeois and repressed (her husband is a sleazy policeman), and one (Bom) a 15-year old singer in a punk band.

The middle-aged one is a sexual masochist and longs for her husband to beat and abuse her, but he treats her with respect 'like I'm his mother' - though he's happy to rape Pepi when he finds that she has marijuana plants in her apartment. The rape is treated very lightly in the film, as are the various degradation to which the other two women eventually come to subject Luci - of course, she wants to be degraded, so it's all right. Early on Bom pisses on Luci, and later she beats her. Eventually Luci is reconciled to her husband, after he subjects her to a savage beating when he finds that she's been living with the other two.

See what I mean?

It rather reminded me of Jubilee, though the S&M sex in that was much sexier. Olvido Gara as Bom even looks like a bit like Toyah Wilcox as Mad.

Watched via laptop, projector and informal distribution at Jane's front room in The Old Co-op on Horns Road, Stroud.