Professor’s remarks: The film can be dismissed for (1) its reliance on the love triangle formula so often seen in soap operas and (2) for its cultural essentialism (on so many levels). Or, the film can be taken seriously for (1) its creative excavation of quotidian history against the backdrop of a major historical event and (2) for its innovations (on so many levels). Many of your comments (below) lean in one of these two directions. I first saw the film when it was released in the US in 1993 and I loved it! I can even point to it as one of the films that inspired my interest in Film Studies. One detail about the film needs to be stressed and remain in view: It is based on a novel written by a woman, and the same woman, Laura Esquivel, wrote the screenplay. The significance of this cannot be overstated. Historically, men have dominated, and continue to dominate, the film industry (everywhere). Like Water for Chocolate won several Ariel awards (Mexico’s equivalent to the Oscars), and this also lends the film a high level of prestige.
Selection of student comments:
Like Water for Chocolate is very focused on women rather than men.
Overall, the film spoke about many important issues in Mexican families in a light-hearted way in almost a folktale storytelling.
Al principio de la película es evidente que hay una narradora específica. Esta narradora está relacionada con la historia que ella va a contar.
For the majority of the film, we know the narrator to be Esperanza’s daughter. Almost every time something supernatural or mystical occurred, she was narrating the scene as it occurs. The narrator is not simply telling us what is happening in the scene, but she is describing the scene rather poetically. Through the addition of a poetic narration to these mystical and seemingly supernatural scenes, Arau turns Tita’s story into a fable. Her story teaches us lessons about life just as fables tell us how to live our lives.
Unfortunately, a number of narrative and cinematic choices subvert this potentially feminist reading and situate women as dependent upon men and servant-like while presenting a story that seems to indicate an inability for Mexican culture to prosper without foreign intervention.
In the end this film seems to be much like a Latin American version of Romeo and Juliet. Two characters fell in love at first sight, however family traditions kept them apart. In the end when they are finally reunited they both die a tragic death.
The purpose of this film is definitely to highlight the themes of sexism, tradition, and injustice within life especially in regards to women. This film definitely takes on a more poetic realist perspective and it demonstrates the aforementioned themes through a lot of symbolism. This is portrayed throughout the movie especially well in different scenes, which the cinematography and mise-en-scene do especially well.
The symbolic meaning of both of their bodies being consumed by flames, was metaphor of the burning passion they felt for each other that increased due to separation, and in the end consumed them both. Their passion was like that of boiling water for chocolate, that sometimes bubbles over if not attended to.
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