Sexo, Pudor y Lagrimas

I have been waiting forever for this movie to come on Region 1 Format. Now, it's finally here. This is a great movie based on the story of six people.

This comedy deals with the romantic lives of 6 people, 2 couples and 2 individuals that make the couples' problems come to light.

Carlos (Victor Huggo Martin) and Ana (amazingly played by Susana Zabeleta) are very different. Carlos is very spiritual and intellectual and Ana is very physical. She feels unsatisfied in their relationship and when Tomas (Demian Bechir), an old friend (and Ana's former lover) visits, their relationship will be put to the test. Carlos will feel insecure and will throw one hell of a jealous fit.

Andrea (Cecilia Suarez) and Miguel (Jorge Salinas) are a well off married couple. Miguel is constantly unfaithful and has never truly understood his wife, trying to fill with dolls the void that she feels at not having a child. María (Monica Dionne), Miguel's former lover, stays with them whilst visiting Mexico and the attraction between Miguel and María builds up.

After an impasse, the lines are divided and its women versus men. This results in a lot of hilarity, and self-reflection.

This is a great and funny movie. Highly recommended.

I saw this film five years ago when it was first released in mexico and i remember that in that point in time mexican cinema was non existent, people just did not want to see mexican movies, this at that time broke all box office records as the most profitable movie ever produced in mexico and is directly responsible for the success of future movies like Amores Perros, Y tu Mama Tambien and The Crime Of Padre Amaro, this movie is a milestone in mexican filmmaking and a must see.

SEX, SHAME AND TEARS is a difficult movie to classify: for the first part of the movie it feels as though we are going to be eaves-dropping on the lives of the fashionable, aspiring middle class Yuppies who live a breakneck speed, seemingly more involved with parties than with personal concerns. How this changes into a meaningfully significant movie is to the credit of writer director Antonio Serrano (Lucia, Lucia', etc).

Carlos (Victor Huggo Martin) is a pseudointellectual who spends most of his day meditating and the remainder of his time writing about sex articles on his PC (though he doesn't appear to be a sensualist in life!). He rooms with Ana (Susana Zabeleta) who is Carlos' opposite - a sensualist, exotic photographer who just happens to lust after Carlos without success. Their friends, who visibly live in a condo opposite them, are Miguel (Jorge Salinas) a lothario who abandoned his dream of being a cinematographer for the very lucrative job and lifestyle of a graphic designer and though married to Andrea (Cecilia Suarez), a would be model/extra movie actress who suffers from insecurity and low self esteem at Miguel's hands, the marriage is rocky and abusive.

Enter the change makers: Tomas (Demian Bechir) is an old chum of Carlos' and Ana's (Ana had an affair with him while the three were in college together) and is a hedonist with no strings, a worldly pleasure seeker who is invited to move in with the couple - to Ana's delight and Carlos' chagrin. Across the way Maria (Monica Dionne), a veterinarian and Miguel's old college sweetheart, moves in, having been abandoned by her English husband. These two characters ignite fires that result in a battle of the sexes, and the three women take over Miguel's condo while the three men take over Carlos' condo. They swear off members of the opposite sex and the results of their mutual standoff (while always totally in view of each other through facing windows) forms the crux of the film and its ending. Each of the six characters enters into a realm of self-discovery and the individual results are both happy and sad.

The joy of this well made movie is in the handling of the dialogue and the merging of the superficial with the spiritual growth. All of the actors are fine and we are left feeling as though we have grown with them. A bristling, bustling, fast paced movie that says a lot about relationships as we experience them today. In Spanish with English Subtitles.

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