Petra Martínez Movies

Spanish helmer Jaime Rosales, who dazzled the world with his debut, the 2003 serial killer drama The Hours of the Day, returns to screens for the very different sophomore outing Fragments of Loneliness (AKA Solitary Fragments, 2007) - a defiantly understated and minimalist slice-of-life drama that dissects and explores a myriad of issues affecting contemporary European women. Throughout the narrative, Rosales crisscrosses two ostensibly unrelated substories, which only find a point of intersection in the blood relation of two minor characters. The first tale revolves around Adela (Sonia Almarcha), a woman who lives in the picturesque Basque region of northern Spain. She leads a generally unremarkable existence - separated from her husband Pedro (Jose Luis Torrijo), she struggles to raise their son, Miguelito (Eric Garcia) and provide for her own aging father (Juan Margallo) while working at a dull job in an office. When the monotony and pressure overwhelm Adela, she suddenly cuts loose and moves to busy Madrid, Miguelito in tow, to begin a new life as a conference assistant. Mother and son opt to share a flat with a woman named Ines (Miriam Correa and her romantic partner, Carlos (Luis Villanueva). Adela's life appears to be on the up and up; then tragedy strikes. Meanwhile, in the film's second tale, Ines's widowed mother, the supermarket proprietor Antonia (Petra Martinez) buckles under the strain wrought by her second and third daughters. One, Nieves (Nuria Mencia) indicates that she's dying of terminal cancer; the other; Helena (Maria Bazan) begs Antonia to tap her boyfriend Manolo (Jesus Cracio) for money to finance a second residence. Instead, Antonia opts to sell the first, which threatens to alienate Helena. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide

Filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar takes a look at his own adolescence as well as confronting the issue of sexual misconduct in the Catholic Church in this stylish drama, which was chosen to open the 2004 Cannes Film Festival. Enrique Goded (Fele Martínez) is a Spanish filmmaker who is having trouble settling on a new project when he's approached by Ignacio Rodriguez (Gael García Bernal), who was his close friend when they were schoolboys. Goded, who fell in love for the first time with Rodriguez, barely recognizes the man as his former crush, but agrees to read the short story he's written. The tale turns out to be an semi-autobiographical account of their days in a Catholic boarding school, in which a cross-dressing night-club performer named Zahara (also played by Bernal) hooks up with a man named Enrique (Alberto Ferreiro), who turns out to have been his first lover when he was a student. Recalling their school days, Zahara tracks down Father Manolo (Daniel Giménez Cacho), one of his teachers from school with pedophilic tendencies, and threatens to expose the priest's attempts to seduce him and ruin his relationship with Enrique years ago. Goded decides to use the story as the basis for his next film, and Rodriguez, an out-of-work actor, makes it clear he's eager to play Zahara. However, Goded isn't certain if Rodriguez is the right actor for the role, or if he's even the man he claims to be; an angry conflict with Rodriguez leads Goded back to the real Ignacio's mother (Petra Martínez). ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide