1. Everything you need to know about VOLVER …and how it relates to you and the world around you. Includes info on the actors, director, with news, reviews, and photos. Visual Review visual review by david bruce visualhollywood.com

2. The backdrop is Madrid and its lively working-class neighborhoods, where the immigrants from the various Spanish provinces share dreams, lives and fortune with a multitude of ethnic groups, and other races. At the heart of this social framework, three generations of women who survive wind, fire and even death, thanks to audacity, goodness and a limitless vitality. SHORT SYNOPSIS MOVIES CONTAIN THE ESSENCE OF BEING HUMAN Left to right: Yohana Cabo as Paula, Lola Duenas as Sole, Carmen Maura as Grandmother Irene, Penelope Cruz as Raimunda

3. YOHANA COBO Paula is a Spanish film and television actress. KEY ACTORS PENÉLOPE CRUZ Raimunda is a Golden Globe and Academy Award- nominated Spanish actress. CARMEN MAURA Irene In 2006 she Won Best Actress at the Cannes Film Festival. In 2001 she won the Goya Award for Best Actress CINEMATIC ART HAS TRANSFORMING POWER

4. At present she is shooting “Lo que sé de Lolaseparadas”. Lola Duenas as Sole At present she is shooting “Lo que sé de Lolaseparadas”. KEY TALENT Pedro Almodovar Director briefly described. This will give you a better sense what you might expect in terms of the story. Bianco Portillo, as Agustina Very popular thanks to the television series “Siete vidas”, Blanca has also appeared in several films. OUR ARTISTS ARE OUR LIBERATORS

5. ARTIST HIGHLIGHT PENÉLOPE CRUZ Raimunda Penélope Cruz Sánchez (born April 28, 1974 in Madrid, Spain), better known as Penélope Cruz, is a Golden Globe and Academy Award- nominated Spanish actress. Originally a dancer, she soon moved into Spanish television, and since then she has appeared in a string of films, in Spanish, English, French and Italian. ACTORS ARE LIBERATORS IN MASQUERADE

6. ARTIST HIGHLIGHT CARMEN MAURA Irene She began in one of the most difficult areas, the one where you learn most, café theatre. Her portrayal of Marilyn Monroe was one of the milestones in this sub-genre in the 70s. With a career that spans over thirty years, it is impossible to summarize the national and international productions, in cinema, theatre and television, in which Carmen has participated, or the awards she has won. Actors help us: laugh, be happy, cry, get angry, and even think. Can there be any better gifts?

7. ARTIST HIGHLIGHT PEDRO ALMODÓVAR Director Pedro Almodóvar Caballero born September 24, 1951) is a two-time Academy Award-winning Spanish filmmaker. Since making his first commercial film in the 1980s, he has written, directed, acted in and/or produced nearly 30 films. His films are characterized by elements of melodrama and high camp. His late mother Francisca Caballero and brother Agustín Almodóvar often appear in cameo roles in his movies. His films often portray strong female characters, homosexuals and transsexuals. FILMMAKERS ARE REVOLUTIONARIES POSING AS ENTERTAINERS

8. EXTENDED SYNOPSIS Thematically, the film centers upon return both in the dead returning and in the form of cycles of re- occurrences. The film opens in a cemetery full of women cleaning and tending to their own and their family gravestones. Two sisters, Raimunda (Penélope Cruz) and Sole (Lola Dueñas) and Raimunda's daughter Paula (Yohana Cobo) are cleaning the grave of their parents who had died in a tragic fire. The events which had occurred on the night of the fire are only gradually revealed, but are central to the plot of the film. STORIES ARE TRANSFORMING Left: Penelope Cruz as Raimunda, Middle: Yohana Cobo as Paula, Right: Lola Duenas as Sole

9. EXTENDED SYNOPSIS After their Aunt Paula dies, Sole returns to the village for the funeral. Agustina (Blanca Portillo), Aunt Paula’s neighbor whose mother had disappeared without a trace three years ago, tells Sole that she has heard the aunt talking with Sole's departed mother, Irene. Agustina helps Sole, who is “terrified of the dead”, to avoid seeing the corpse at the funeral. In her aunt’s house, Sole encounters the ghost of her mother, who had “died in the arms of her husband” in the fire. Arriving home, she hears a knocking sound from the rear of her car, and opens the car and again encounters her mother's ghost. She has brought luggage and intends to stay with Sole for a while. Agustina helps Sole ALL KIDS ARE BORN ARTISTS. WHAT IS NATURAL IS ESSENTIAL.

10. EXTENDED SYNOPSIS Sole, managing to restrain her fright, talks with her departed mother Irene Sole, managing to restrain her fright, talks with her departed mother Irene -- while giving her a haircut and dye job in the hair salon she operates in her apartment -- and she tries to find out why she has returned, asking if the she has something she has left undone in her life, causing her to return. She is told that the mother does have issues to resolve; it is later revealed that these issues revolve around the reasons why Raimunda hates her and why she is afraid to reveal herself to Raimunda. In the meantime, she assists Sole in shampooing and rinsing customers, posing as a Russian woman who doesn’t understand a word of Spanish -- but who can understand gestures extremely well. STORIES EMBODY THE ESSENCE BEING HUMAN

11. EXTENDED SYNOPSIS Meanwhile Raimunda and her daughter have a different death to cope with. Paula has stabbed her father, Paco, when he attempted to force himself upon her, telling Paula that he “is not her father”. Lying dead and bloody on the kitchen floor, Paco’s corpse is cleaned and wrapped in a blanket, which Raimunda and Paula drag to a nearby -- and fortunately unused -- restaurant. Raimunda, who has been entrusted with the keys to the establishment in order to help the owner lease it, hides the body in the restaurant’s deep freeze. This leads to her meeting someone from a film crew seeking a place to feed his crew of thirty people. Raimunda strikes a deal to cater for the crew, and finds herself suddenly in the restaurant business. Raimunda and her daughter CINEMATIC STORY TELLING IS A PROFOUNDLY HUMANIZING ENDEAVOR

12. EXTENDED SYNOPSIS This extended synopsis will allow us the opportunity to underscore key roles In a quiet mother-daughter moment with Raimunda, Paula finds out that Paco -- whose corpse still lies hidden in the freezer -- was not in fact her father. Raimunda promises to tell her the whole story, not now but “en un otro momento”. Raimunda gets a phone call from Agustina, who tells Raimunda that she is in the city because she has gone to the hospital. Agustina has just learned that she has cancer and wants Raimunda to come visit her. Raimunda protests that she is busy, but eventually makes the trip to the hospital. While she is there, Agustina asks her if she has seen her mother’s ghost. Raimunda has not, but Agustina asks her to find out from her mother -- if she should return -- about the fate of Agustina's own mother, who had disappeared two years ago without a trace… (for more see the movie)

13. LIFE CONNECTIONS V OLVER CELEBRATES DEATH AS A CONTINUING FORM OF LIFE A good man never dies— In worthy deed and prayer And helpful hands, and honest eyes, If smiles or tears be there; Who lives for you and me— Lives for the world he tries To help—he lives eternally. A good man never dies. --James Whitcomb Riley (1849–1916) As a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so life well used brings happy death. --Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519) As the mother’s womb holds us for nine months, making us ready, not for the womb itself, but for life, just so, through our lives, we are making ourselves ready for another birth.... Therefore, look forward without fear to that appointed hour—the last hour of the body, but not of the soul.... That day, which you fear as being the end of all things, is the birthday of your eternity. --Lucius Annaeus Seneca (c. 4 b.c.–a.d. 65) ART AS A LIBERATING FORCE

14. CRITICAL OPINION THE FREE SPEECH DISCUSSION OF THE ARTS IS THE MARK OF A FREE SOCIETY “Pedro Almodóvar has made yet another picture that moves beyond camp into a realm of wise, luxuriant humanism.” --A.O. Scott New York Times "Richly evocative.“ --Jonathan Holland Variety “You do not want to miss this one.” --Peter Travers Rolling Stone “This is a movie about mothers and children that dispatches with the usual goopy sentiment. Volver reassures us that you can go home again -- if only in the movies.” --Stephanie Zacharek Salon.com “Cruz has never been more radiant and funny: Comparisons to Sophia Loren in her Vittorio DeSica heyday are flying about, and richly warranted.” --Jan Stuart Newsday Reviews are over 90% positive.

15. VISUAL HOLLYWOOD REVIEW OF VOLVER BY DAVID BRUCE Movies like this are rare. Words like: unusual, innovative, original, and even revolutionary fall short of being able to adequately describe this film. Here is a film that explores the continuation of life even in death in an imaginative way the avoids the silly and overdone trappings of religion. It explores the grand themes of human connectedness and family relationships. The acting is superb and demonstrate s, just as The Devil Wears Prada did, the power of a mostly female cast. ART IS THE LANGUAGE OF LIBERATION

16. FINDING TRUTH IN THIS PARTICULAR STORY “During the writing of the script and the filming, my (late) mother was always present and very near. I don’t know if the film is good –I-’m not the one to say, but I’m sure that it did me a lot of good to make it. “…I am talking… “death”, not just mine and that of my loved ones but the merciless disappearance of all that is alive. I have never accepted or understood it. And that puts you in a distressing situation when faced with the increasingly faster passing of time. “The most important thing that comes back in “Volver” is the ghost of a mother, who appears to her daughters. In my village those things happen (I grew up hearing stories of apparitions), yet I don’t believe in apparitions.” --Pedro Almodóvar (writer/director) VisualHollywood.com Society is only as free as its arts. Art is the voice of human freedom.

17. TRIVIA AND NEWS --The film's title is pronounced "Bol-Ber" --According to Pedro Almodóvar, there's only one fake element in Raimunda's (Penélope Cruz) body: the bottom. He said that this kind of characters are usually big-bottomed people, and that Cruz is just too stylized. --The film got rave reviews when it was released in Spain. Fotogramas, the country's top film magazine, gave it a five-star rating --It also received a standing ovation when it was screened as part of the official selection at the Cannes Film Festival, and won the Best Screenplay award as well as the award for Best Actress -- which was shared by the six stars of the film. In addition, the film received two nominations at the 2006 Golden Globes: Best Actress for Penélope Cruz as well as Best Foreign Language Film. Cruz also received Academy Award, BAFTA and Screen Actors Guild Award nominations for Best Actress.

18. WHY MOVIES ARE SO IMPORTANT "The meaning of life is the most urgent of questions" --Albert Camus (Existentialist thinker. "The meaning of life is the most urgent of questions" --Albert Camus (Existentialist thinker). In “Movies and the Meaning of Life” author Kimberly Blessing points out that movies can help us reflect on five of life’s most important questions: 1) What is reality and how can I know it? 2) How can I find my true identity? 3) What the significance of my interactions with others? 4) What’s the point of my life? 5) How ought I to live my life? The idea behind Visual Hollywood is that Movies can and must play an essential role helping us explore the meaning of our existence and our life together. No other quest is more necessary or important. Movies are powerful. Movies bring personal meaning, and can contribute to a peaceful world. Cinematic story telling can be a transforming event. Visual Hollywood takes an existential approach to life. We celebrate with human freedom. We use movies and the arts as a means of understanding the human condition and our collective relation to the world around us. Our basic quest is: 1. To know what it means to be human in the world. 2. The pursuit of human freedom. To restrict creativity is to restrict the very nature of the Creator

19. visual review by visualhollywood.com This Visual Hollywood work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution -NonCommercial - ShareAlike 2.5 License. You may display this work on your own site. You are free: to copy, distribute, display under the following conditions: 1. Attribution - Credit VisualHollywood.com and make a web link. 2. Noncommercial - You may not use this work for commercial purposes. All film stills, trailers, video clips and trademarks are the property of their respective owners and may not be reproduced for any reason whatsoever. This review is © 2006 David Bruce. All rights reserved. "Visual Hollywood " is a trademark owned by David Bruce.