Starring: Salma Hayek, Alfred Molina, Geoffrey Rush
Director: Julie Taymor
Category: IIB
The vibrant, colourful and controversial life of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo has long been one of cinema's most sought-after projects. Madonna and Jennifer Lopez have been in the frame to bring Kahlo's story to the silver screen but the task eventually fell to Salma Hayek (above) - an actor not exactly known up to this point for her dramatic prowess. But it's a good job Hayek got the nod; after seeing Frida it's obvious no-one else could have pulled this off.
Hayek becomes Kahlo, from a flirty schoolgirl to a bed-ridden middle-aged woman, and she is ultimately the film's saving grace as, for all the broad strokes director Julie Taymor (Titus) brings to this canvas, the film comes out looking pretty flat.
The main problem is the script, which dances from episode to episode rather than giving us any real flow of events. It's all very stop-start. We begin with young Kahlo living through polio and a horrific accident; progress to her chance encounter with famed artist Diego Rivera (Alfred Molina); her discovery as an artist and her many and varied affairs (among them Leon Trotsky, played with gay abandon by Geoffrey Rush). The tempestuous relationship with Rivera draws the most attention, and is most successful for the viewer due in no small part to the passion Molina brings to his role. Hayek's Oscar nomination says all that needs to be said about her performance - she acts here as if her life depended on it.
