I'm So Excited!

Synopsis;  A plane bound from Spain to Mexico is flying in circles around Toledo because its landing gear has been damaged by a distracted ground crew.

For those who know the work of Pedro Almodóvar I'm So Excited! Is a visit back to the soap-opera-ish comedies of the 1980s with which the director made his name. Relative to his subsequent more substantial films such as The Flower Of My Secret and Talk To Her and his offering previous to this, The Skin I Live In, it is a disposable project, intentionally over-the-top, gay-ly sex-obsessed but only intermittently funny.

After a cameo in which Almodóvar alumni Penélope Cruz and Antonio Banderas set-up the situation, the film assumes the context to which it is largely confined for its duration  -  the business-class section of a plane. Here a handful of passengers, including a dominatrix (Cecilia Roth) and virgin psychic (Lola Duenas), are served by a trio of outrageously gay flight attendants (Javier Cámara, who had been in Almodóvar's 2004 film, Bad Education, Raúl Arévalo, Carlos Areces) whilst the pilot (Antonio de la Torre), a married man who is having an affair with the senior attendant, and his ostensibly straight co-pilot (Hugo Silva) prepare for an emergency landing. If you think that this sounds like a variation on the 1980 classic comedy Airplane! you wouldn’t be far off the mark.  It’s pretty much the same idea steeped in Almodóvar’s polymorphically perverse sexual agenda (the Spanish title means “Lovers In Transit”) and thus without the mainstream appeal.

The retro production design is as fab as you might expect from the visually acute director and if you have a liking for camp comedy you won’t be disappointed but in all other respects I'm So Excited! is Almodóvar tossing off a bit of light relief prior to a more challenging project.

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