Saturday 21 November 2009
Actress Penelope Cruz shines in "Broken Embraces," her fourth movie with Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodovar.
Directed and written by Pedro Almodóvar. Produced by Esther García. Photographed by Rodrigo Prieto. Edited by José Salcedo. Music by Alberto Iglesias.
With Penélope Cruz, Lluís Homar, Blanca Portillo, Tamar Novas, José Louis Gómez.
Playing in Manhattan at the Lincoln Plaza Cinemas, 1886 Broadway, and Landmark Sunshine Cinema, 141-143 E. Houston St.
In the most indelible scene of "Broken Embraces" ("Los abrazos rotos"), Pedro Almodóvar's latest vivid melodrama, Penélope Cruz plays dress-up.
As an aspiring actress named Lena, she's testing wardrobe for a film.
She quickly turns to the camera in one wig after another, each time flashing the megawatt smile of a silver screen goddess. It might be Lena's first movie, but Cruz has gotten the hang of this.
In her fourth film with Almodóvar, Cruz gives her most glamorous performance yet, and a fitting one, too, as "Broken Embraces" is in many ways a movie about movies. Cruz is even done up like Audrey Hepburn.
Transformation, like Lena's rapid shape-shifting, is a theme throughout. Almodóvar relishes the metamorphoses actors and people undertake while at the same time mournfully observing this constant flight from self.
At the center of the film is Mateo Blanco (Lluís Homar), a writer who takes his nom de plume, Harry Caine, after being blinded in a car accident years earlier. He's a successful screenwriter with a manager, Judit García (Blanca Portillo), whose son Diego (Tamar Novas) also assists him.
"I was always tempted by the thought of being someone else," he narrates.
Mateo's past returns, though, when a young filmmaker approaches him about a script. Dressed in a black leather jacket and sunglasses, the man introduces himself as Ray X. We soon learn that his identity, too, is a concealment; he used to be an awkward teenager named Ernesto Junior.
Ernesto Junior's visit prompts consternation and a long flashback. (There's a great deal of time shifting and story swapping.)
We travel back to Mateo meeting Lena in 1994, when he could still see. His first sight of Lena — in ravishing close-up — is played like Rita Hayworth's entrance in "Gilda." Mateo immediately falls for her and casts her for his film, a comedy.
Lena lives with an older, wealthy businessman named Ernesto Martel (José Louis Gómez), Ernesto Junior's father. She doesn't love him, but is indebted to him for helping her sick father.
Ernesto, though, is obsessed with Lena. To control her, he finances Mateo's movie and sends Junior to document everything Lena does on set. Each night, he watches the footage with a lip reader, soon discovering the budding love between Lena and Mateo.
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Born Penélope Cruz SánchezApril 28, 1974 (1974-04-28) (age 35)Alcobendas, Community of Madrid, Spain Occupation Actress Years active 1990–present
Penélope Cruz Sánchez born April 28, 1974, better known as Penélope Cruz, is a Spanish actress. She gathered critical acclaim as a young actress for films such as Jamón, Jamón, La Niña de tus ojos, and Belle époque. She has also starred in several American films such as Blow, Vanilla Sky, and Vicky Cristina Barcelona. She is perhaps best known for her work with acclaimed Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar, in Broken Embraces, Volver and All About My Mother.
"I love this show. This show has been my life. And I love it enough to know when it's time to say goodbye," she said, holding back tears. "Twenty-five years feels right in my bones, and it feels right in my spirit. It's the perfect number, the exact right time."For the hundreds of network affiliates who depended on Winfrey to deliver millions of viewers every day, Friday's announcement starts an 18-month clock to find a way to fill the space left behind after the end of the most successful daytime talk show in television history. Winfrey's show "is one of daytime television's very foundations," said Larry Gerbrandt, an analyst for the firm Media Valuation Partners in Los Angeles. "You could, and stations did, build their schedules around her. They gave it the best time period, leading into their news, and used it to promote other shows."
Winfrey cautioned viewers that they would hear "a lot of speculation in the press about why I am making this decision," warning them not to listen to the "conjecture." But she offered no specifics about her plans for the future, except to say that she intended to produce the best possible shows during the final two years. "I just wanted to say whether you've been here with me from the beginning or you came on board last week, I want you all to know that my relationship with you is one that I hold very dear," she said. "Your trust in me, the sharing of your precious time every day with me has brought me the greatest joy I have ever known."
It has also brought her a fortune estimated at $2.7 billion. As a newcomer, she chipped away at the dominance of Phil Donahue. She flirted with a tabloid format for a time, but gradually reinvented her show to focus on themes of inspiration, hope and the power of positive thinking."She's made such an imprint in today's society. She's just part of everyone's lives," said Yasmeen Elhaj, a 19-year-old student from Chicago who was in the studio for Friday's announcement. "People talk about Oprah like that's her friend. So that's why everyone is sad to see her go because she's just a giving person, feels like she's your home girl." The show has a breadth that no other has been able to match. A serious hour on domestic abuse could be followed the next day by a rollicking party with the Black Eyed Peas.
When Whitney Houston and Sarah Palin wanted to talk this fall, Winfrey's show was their first stop. An endorsement by Winfrey for her book club is a make-or-break opportunity for authors. But even Winfrey was not immune to the dips in ratings that have plagued broadcasters as viewers flock to specialty programming on cable. Her average audience — easily the largest of daytime talk shows — fell from 12.6 million in 1991-92 to 6.2 million in 2008-2009.
This season, boosted by blockbuster interviews with Palin, Houston and others, the show is doing better, averaging 7.2 million viewers a day.The decline in audience numbers has long argued for a move to cable, where audiences are increasingly able to finding niche programming. Winfrey, 55, is widely expected to start up a new talk show on OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network, a joint venture with Discovery Communications Inc. that was first announced last year. It will replace the Discovery Health Channel and debut in some 80 million homes. Discovery is pouring resources into OWN to prepare for its January 2011 launch. Chief Financial Officer Brad Singer told analysts this month that Discovery plans to invest $30 million to $40 million in 2009 on programming, staffing and other costs.
Discovery also is lending the venture $100 million, and OWN hired "Oprah" co-executive producer Lisa Erspamer this month as its chief creative officer. Erspamer is expected to move from Chicago to Los Angeles in January. Winfrey's move to cable leaves a gap in the afternoon programming at many TV stations, where it leads into the local evening news and is popular with advertisers. At the peak of her ratings in the 1990s, Oprah could almost single-handedly prop up the newscast on WFAA-TV in Dallas, an ABC affiliate, because her fans stayed with the station, said Mike Devlin, the station's president and general manager. "I hate to see her go. I'm an Oprah fan," Devlin said. "But all things end." There are other syndicated shows available — "Live with Regis and Kelly," "The Ellen DeGeneres Show," "Rachael Ray Show," "Dr. Phil" and "The Tyra Show" — but none has the reach or influence of "Oprah." And it's not easy to come up with a winning formula. Magic Johnson, Megan Mullally, Queen Latifah, Tony Danza, Lauren Hutton, Sinbad and Keenen Ivory Wayans are just some of the people who have tried to launch talk shows with abysmal results. "There's always cycles in the television business," said Emily Barr, the president and general manager at WLS-TV in Chicago. "We are thrilled to have had this long association with Oprah and we will miss her, but we will also move on and see what else is out there."
Oprah Winfey in tears during her announcement. She is quiting with The Oprah Winfrey Show in 2011. She makes the show then 25 years, this video belongs to TMZ and Harpo