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And why not make your protagonist a gay porn director? Pablo (Eusebio Poncelo) is a horny man about town, juggling his busy career, his one night stands, his lover Juan (Miguel Molina), and the needs of Tina, his volatile and hilarious transsexual sister (Almodóvar muse Carmen Maura). Tina is the kind of woman who is so hot and bothered that when she sees a street cleaner spraying down a sidewalk, she barks at him, 'Hose me down!,' and he does. An aspiring actress, her current goal is to star in a play called 'The Human Voice,' a plot line which serves to inspire Almodóvar's subsequent film, the unforgettable Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown. Can she act? Well, she's certainly dramatic, tearing up the streets of Madrid in her short skirts, throwing tantrums all along the way.
Pablo's life gets even more complicated when he finds himself attracted to Antonio (Banderas), a beautiful boy whose arrival on the scene inspires a bit of a bizarre love triangle among the three men. The problem is that Antonio is somewhat nuts and obsessively clingy in that Fatal Attraction way, and when he discovers a love letter that appears to be from Juan to Pablo, his jealousy knows no bounds. Things get dangerous fast. Perhaps his best chance at hanging on to Pablo is to satisfy his voracious sexual appetite. (Which, by the way, has inspired critics to wonder what would have happened to Banderas's career if this had been his first American movie. Good question!)
As usual in the Almodóvar orbit there are numerous wacky subplots that involve various transgressions of the legal or sexual kind, a bevy of additional female characters including a real transsexual (Bibi Anderson), and a great soundtrack. And as for the local priests? Suffice it to say that they never fare well in Pedro's world. So what else is there to do but sit back and go along for the ride, wondering in amazement just how much Almodóvar was able to get away with just 12 short years after Spain woke up from the oppressive cultural coma of the Franco era. Law of Desire is a pivotal and unmissable piece of the Almodóvar puzzle, a romp that is Pedro at his young and kinky best.
Aka La ley del deseo.
