Sex And Lucia

Synopsis: Lucia (Paz Vega) works as a waitress in a busy café. Her boyfriend Lorenzo (Tristan Ulloa) is a novelist who is in the process of writing his second novel and is experiencing a fair dose of writer’s block. Things aren’t going too well, in fact it looks as if Lorenzo is suicidal. From this point in the film, we reach back into the past to discover how Lucia and Lorenzo arrived at such a dark place. We also reach into the future to see how they manage to get themselves out of the mess their life together has become.

Sex And Lucia is the kind of film it is good to go to knowing as little as possible, that is other than the best idea is to surrender to the journey on which you are about to be taken. However, you may be one of those film-goers who ignores what reviewers have to say, and if this is the case, then read on. The title provides fair warning that you will encounter sex, and lots of it. I have become quite accustomed to this in recent times and, so, often forget to mention it.

Medem originally wrote two separate stories, which he combines in this film; one entitled Lucia, the other El Sexo. It helps to know this in order to get some idea of the structure of the film. It is complex, and that’s not only in the way it moves through past, present and future. Because Lorenzo is the kind of author whose writing is heavily influenced by what is happening in his life, the line between what he is writing and what is "real" becomes progressively more blurred as the film unfolds.

One of the issues Medem intended to address here, is the way in which our sexuality affects our lives. This can be seen in the way Lucia becomes obsessed with Lorenzo and experiences her love for him in such an intense way, that on the verge of orgasm, she feels that she is about to die. It is also seen when Elena (Najwa Nimri) a woman with whom Lorenzo has a one night stand, comes back into his life because of the result of that same wild night of sex.

A fair share of the dialogue is dedicated to stories and story-telling. Lucia is drawn to Lorenzo because of what he has written in his first novel. Lorenzo tells stories to help children sleep, and help mothers get over their grief. The symbolism of the water that surrounds the island, and the island itself become re-occurring motifs throughout the film, as does the sun and the moon.

This is the fifth film I have seen in the last ten days that deals with issues of what is real. It is clearly the question for our times and whether or not you'll find it satisfactorily answered here, Sex and Lucia provides enough sensorial distraction that the conundrum can be passed on to the next film-maker brave enough to accept the calling.

 

 

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