Review of Cria! (1976) by Roger T — 19 Jun 2011
The film is fluid and feminine - you can see how Saura progressed from this danse macabre to his ater, vibrant musicals - and quite possibly a reaction to the patriarchal tyranny of the Franco regime, but its form shouldn't blind us to how tough it is, too.
.. What's most odd about Saura's film is that it should show this little joy at the death of a tyrant - as liberated Spaniards would surely have felt - and instead gives off morbid, uncanny frissons of deja vu, of a history coming to repeat itself.
When Ana sees her mother for the last time, the latter is clutching her stomach, bleeding out like a spectral sister to Harriet Andersson in "Cries and Whispers"; reeling on her bedclothes, her final words are the less-than-reassuring "It's all a lie.
There is nothing." The chicken feet in the family fridge are a constant, there at the beginning and again at the end, the suffering of their erstwhile owners taken for given. It's a film about looking death in the eye, and being powerless to do anything but accept it.
This review of Cria! (1976) was written by Roger T on 19 Jun 2011.
Cria! has generally received very positive reviews.
Was this review helpful?
