I won’t give too much away about The Skin I Live In (La piel que habito): unlike Woody Allen’s films, an Almodóvar doesn’t come along every year, so it’s important to savour them. Psychologists at the University of San Diego recently discovered that people tended to enjoy short stories more when they already knew the ending. I don’t know if the same holds true for cinema, but Pedro Almódovar’s most recent film would be an excellent test case. As an innocent first-time viewer, you are intrigued as the film uncovers its mysteries and surprises; armed with that same knowledge from the beginning, you would watch the film differently. For its sumptuous visual qualities and dark comedy, Almodóvar’s work has always stood up well to multiple viewings, but the twists in The Skin I Live In add another reason to watch this film more than once.
The Skin I Live In is the story of plastic surgeon Dr Robert Ledgard (Antonio Banderas) and his patient, Vera, who occupies a room in the doctor’s isolated villa/clinic in Toledo. From the top of her neck to the tips of her toes, Vera is enveloped in a flesh-coloured body stocking: although she is young, beautiful and lithe, it is clear that her body has gone through significant trauma. The calm and elegant Robert embodies contradictions of his own: after a lecture in which he outlines his pioneering work on skin grafts for burn patients, he receives a warning from the prime minister that research into transgenic therapy is strictly forbidden. The surgeon is clearly talented, but unconventional in his approach. His obsession with work is influenced by family tragedies involving his wife and daughter, events which may have driven him to madness.
An obvious reference point for the mad plastic surgeon film is Georges Franju’s Les Yeux sans visage (Eyes Without a Face, 1960), where horror derived from a doctor’s insane determination to perform a successful face transplant for his disfigured daughter. While featuring similar themes, The Skin I Live In is much less frightening than Franju’s film because of Almodóvar’s characteristic blend of comedy and humanity in the midst of adversity. Rather than throwing in moments of comic relief, Almodóvar typically draws out the unexpected humour inherent in life-or-death situations. In some of his films, this technique develops into madcap absurdity, but The Skin I Live In is slightly more sombre. The film incorporates horror’s conventions of tragic situations that realise our worst fears, but regularly turns a knowing, ironic gaze on such circumstances: as a result, we giggle at tragedy that descends for a moment into melodrama, and laugh nervously as the worst possible thing that could happen, happens.
In addition to comedy, what saves The Skin I Live In from full-blown horror is that its central characters, both male and female, are very strong. Almodóvar has an admirable record of portraying, in particular, women who refuse to crumble: maintaining their individuality, they confront life’s challenges with practicality and common sense. The women in horror films, on the other hand, are victims precisely because they are weak, and while their defencelessness makes the violence seem more cruel, it can also paradoxically make it less important: in the feral world of the horror film, defencelessness naturally invites attack, like a gazelle invites a crocodile. Although The Skin I Live In, like Les Yeux sans visage, has its fair share of defenceless, suicidal women, the most important characters have a sense of self that makes them defiantly adaptable and resilient, exactly the antidote to horror’s terror through annihilation.
