MQFF REVIEW: Blue and Not So Pink (2012, Dir. Miguel Ferrari)

Walking out of Miguel Ferrari's respectfully calibrated melodrama, Red and Not So Pink (Azul y no tan rosa), I was struck by its similarities to Pedro Almodóvar's similarly melodramatic All About My Mother. Of course, this Venezuelan knock-off can't hold a candle to Almodóvar's genre bending brilliance but that doesn't mean we shouldn't applaud his considerable ambition.

Like All About My Mother, Blue and Not So Pink is a number of films rolled into one. Primarily, it is about grief, though here it is the loss of a partner rather than a son. There is a son though, and he's made the trip to Caracas from Madrid to reconcile with his gay father. The rebuilding of that relationship is the film's other substantial narrative.

There is also a performance piece, a side order of domestic violence, a vigilante revenge drama, and a teen coming of age drama thrown into the mix. And all that is before we even take into account the scene-stealing flamboyance of the film's trans character, played to the nines by telenovela actress Hilda Abrahamz.

Watching Ferrari at work reveals the eloquence of Almodóvar's cinema. Where Pedro's films are almost uniformly cohesive, Blue and Not So Pink really does feel like five or six movies squeezed in together. Luckily, at least four of them are worth the time. It may not be elegant but it is still emotionally engaging. It had me welling up, despite myself.

One of the more guilty pleasures of MQFF but a pleasure nonetheless.

★★★☆

Trailer:

Azul y no tan rosa screened as part of the 2014 Melbourne Queer Film Festival.