Like Water for Chocolate

Like Water for Chocolate

Let me start by saying that I truly enjoyed this film. It had a little bit of a Cinderella story line and also that of Lady Godiva. I only wish that Tita and Pedro could have had a longer life together. Now having said that, what a way to go! To have that much love and passion inside that it engulfed them both in flames. Their love was powerful, passionate and truly lasted a lifetime.
Magic realism is intertwined throughout this film. We see it from start to finish. It is so well done that we know what is occurring is fantasy but with the way it is presented it seems real. The way the rose sauce affects everyone, especially Gertrudis, can’t happen in reality but when it occurs in the film it seems real to us. Another example of magic realism is when we see the ghost of Nacha and Elena talking to Tita. Nacha’s ghost represented love giving Tita advice on everything from cooking to healing Pedro’s burns. Elena’s ghost represented evil. Even being dead didn’t stop her from trying to make Tita’s life miserable and after Tita stood up to her she turned her anger onto Pedro and caused him to be severely burned. But the most powerful example came at the end when Tita started eating the matches which ignited the passion from inside engulfing the two lovers in flames. The movie would definitely not have been as enjoyable without the use of magic realism.
One topic that is discussed throughout the film is that of tradition. I know in my family we have several traditions but none which dictates that as the youngest I would have to take care of my mother until she dies and never be able to marry because of it. I would take care of my mother out of love and respect not because I was ordered to do so. This tradition sentenced Tita to a life of servitude. This is also how this movie reminds me of Cinderella except what makes this film worse is that in Cinderella she was treated badly by her stepmom, Tita was treated like a slave by her own mother. After Elena died, Rosaura threatened to carry on the tradition with her own daughter Esperanza. Tita told Rosaura that she would never allow that to happen and she didn’t. Esperanza was allowed to marry and when she had her own daughter she honored her aunt by naming her own daughter Tita.





This should come as no shock but the common message throughout the film is that of love. It is a message of lost love, denied love, and undying love. The common thread in all of these is Tita. She lost her father shortly after her birth, because she was the youngest she was unable to marry the man that she loved, and from the first moment their eyes met Tita only loved Pedro and they took that love with them to the grave. Love is powerful but as seen in Like Water for Chocolate it is also magical.

Diarios de Motocicleta

What a great film! I could not wait to see where their journey was going to take them. I guess I must live a very sheltered life because I had never heard of Ernesto Guevara until preparing for this class. I am glad that I had not though because I might have been watching with preconceived ideas about who he was instead of how he became that man.
I truly believe that everything happens for a reason. Ernesto was one semester away from becoming a doctor before he and Alberto set out on their 8,000 kilometer road trip across the South American continent. Who in their right mind does such a thing? It is because of this trip though that his life changes in a way that he can't even begin imagine. I even think it is ironic that they call their motorcycle "The Mighty One".
The first stop on the trip is the home of Fuser's girlfriend, Chichina. She lets him know that she will not wait forever for him. We later find out that she gave him $15 American dollars to buy her some fancy underwear, this money helps form him as a leader as we see later on.
During the trip we see that the two friends have very different personalities. Mial is willing to lie to get what he wants and Fuser is caring and honest. We see this when they come upon a house telling the owner that they are doctors on a trip and could use a place to sleep and some food. The owner asks them to look at a lump on his neck and Fuser tells him it is a tumor and needs to be checked. Mial on the other hand tells him that it only looks like a sebaceous cyst and will be just fine. Fuser is not willing to lie at the risk of someone else's life. I think that most leaders start out to be honest and caring.
Next we see how much he enjoys talking to people. This is demonstrated in the scene where the two are pushing "The Mighty One" into the market area of Chile. What political leader doesn't like to talk and meet with people. This is also the first time Mial tries to get Fuser to use Chichina's money to help them. They need money to get the bike fixed, for food, and a place to sleep. Fuser refuses. Fuser ends up having an article printed about them in the local paper which makes them celebrities and this gets them the help that they need. Most leaders are a in their own way a celebrity. We see his caring side when he goes and sees the sick women and tries to make her as comfortable as possible, he does not tell her that she is dying and that there nothing he can do for her.
By now "The Mighty One" has died and they are now walking and hitch hiking to travel. It is during a ride that they meet a couple going to the mines looking for work. They hear the story of how a big landowner took their land from them and how the police wanted to arrest them for being communist. Once at the mine, the husband was picked for work. Fuser yells to the foreman "can't you see that they are thirsty and need water". He is then threatened with being arrested for being on private property. We see how he is starting to care for the poor and less fortunate. All along their travel to Peru we see the poor and homeless and hear more stories on how others have had their land taken from them.
While they are traveling we are read the letters that Fuser has written to his mother. While the letters are being read to us we see the faces of the people they have met along the way and how they are forever etched in his mind.
The next leg of their journey has them on a five day boat trip where Fuser almost dies from an asthma attack and Mial begs him for the $15 so that he can spend the night with a lady of the night. He tries to get the money by reminding him of everything that they had go through together, crashes, the desert, and starvation. Fuser informs him that he no longer has the money, he gave it to the couple back at the mines. This show a selfless act putting others before himself. Another sign of the beginnings of a true leader.
The final leg of their journey has them ending up at a leper's colony. It is here that biggest transformation of his life occurs. His first act of defiance is seen, he refuses to wear gloves when coming in contact with the lepers. He also is able to convince a young women that even though she has leprosy life is still worth living. He also realizes the injustice of the lepers being isolated from the rest of the world. While they are at the colony, Fuser celebrates his 24th birthday. The doctors and staff throw him a birthday party combination going away party, he and Mial were leaving the next day. Fuser gave a toast at the party which can now be looked on as his first political speech. After he finished, giving no regard for his own life, he swam acrossed the river to spend the rest of his birthday and last night with the people he really cared about.
At the end of the journey and before the two friends go their separate ways, Ernesto tells Alberto that something in him has changed and that he no longer sees things in the sam way. The final scenes tell us that he did actually become a doctor and that he went on to join Fidel Castro in the Cuban Revolution. I guess you could truly call this the trip of a lifetime!

Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown

How are Spanish speaking women interactions with men within the same culture? Are the feelings over reacted in the film?

I see the women in this film interacting with men very similar to the way women in the United States do. I am sure there are many of my classmates that will disagree with me but here is why I think this. Pepa was in a relationship that was one sided, and also found out some disturbing news which we found out later was the news that she was pregnant. The combination of the two circumstances made her lose control and react in the manner in which she did. She loved Ivan and needed desperately to talk with him and let him know what she had found out at the doctors office. Women in the United States also end up in relationships with men that are unavailable to them completely, I do not understand this concept of wanting a married man but it happens around us all the time. John Kerry, Tiger Woods, Jesse James, I could go on and on but I think you get the idea. Pepa's friend Candela was attracted to the bad boy and has the personality where she falls in love with whomever she is with. She of course falls in love with the worst of the worst and gets herself into trouble. Again we see this type of behavior in women in the United States, they think they are in love and end up doing things that they know is wrong, just look at the women who followed Charles Manson. Next we have the strong dominating personality of Marisa, Carlos' fiancee. He is what I would call a "whipped puppy", she definitely wears the pants in that relationship. This is also a trait that we see in some women in the United States, it may be my perception but I see this trait in Hillary Clinton and her relationship with past President Bill Clinton. Finally we see Lucia and how the lost love of her life drove her insane, all she wanted to do was be loved. I do think that for the films purpose the feelings of these women were over reacted but not unrealistic. Women have tried and succeeded in committing suicide over a man, women have also done some pretty crazing things in the name of love.

Do you find differences between women in the film and today's American women? What could have been different in the film if the context was the United States.

I have already discussed some of this in my answer above. I think that we can see women in the United States reacting in the same manner as these women. Women fall in love to me easier than men (remember this is my opinion). Men can have a relationship with a women for simple pleasure but I think that women attach emotions to it. That is why we see women react in the same manner as Pepa. Once she found out that Ivan did not really love her she was devastated and her first reaction was to kill herself, then she decided that if she could just talk to him and see him that she could make him stay and love her. It took 48 hours and a reality check for her to realize that he was not worth it. When I was going through nursing school and doing my psych. rotation I had a couple of young girls that were in the hospital because they had tried to kill themselves over men. What I wanted to tell them was to snap out of it, no man is worth taking your own life, of course I couldn't but I wanted too! I also have to admit that I have done some stupid things in the name of love.

My own impression about the film's plot.

I thought the film was OK, I did not think that it was necessarily a comedy though until the final scenes. I thought it was based on a series on coincidences that drove these characters together. At the center of these coincidences was love or should I say the lack of love. The final scene where Ivan's wife tried to kill him showed me a character that will never know true love. He was going away with one women and in a flash he was ready to leave her and go back to Pepa. What a loser!

Do you think there is a difference among women from Spanish America and women from Spanish Europe?

I think there is a difference because I think that there differences in any culture. These differences come in many ways from social status, how women talk to each other, how they interact with men, and what they value in life. In some circumstances women value their status in life over anything else but in other cultures family and friends are most important.

My thoughts on the two boys is that they could be two boys here in the United States. I know in our schools today and even way back when I was in school we had divisions. In my time there were the popular kids (jocks and cheerleaders), geeks (smart kids), hoods (smokers and trouble makers) and nerds (quiet and non popular). Today when I visit my son's schools I see a lot of the same things, popular kids, computer nerds, quiet kids, trouble makers and a new group, Hispanic kids. I can easily see why Gonzalo and Pedro connected. They were both outcasts, Pedro because he was poor and Gonzalo because he was not popular. That made them easy targets for the bullies in the class. Pedro gave Gonzalo the courage to stand up to the bullies for the first time in his life and in doing so gave him the ability to see Pedro as a person and not a class of people. The rest of the students seen Pedro and the other new students as second class citizens, lowest of life that did not belong at their school. It was not until the end of the movie that we were able to see that social class truly made a difference in their friendship, no matter what Gonzalo came from money and Pedro was poor.

There was a huge difference in the rich and the poor in Chile during the time of this movie. I did not even see signs that there was possibly a middle class. You were either rich and had a air that you were better than everyone else or poor and lived in the shanty town and had nothing. I mean the poor even had to share a disgusting outhouse just to go to the bathroom. Times were hard in Chile during this time , even the rich had trouble getting everyday necessities like milk and bread. The difference was that the rich had the money and means to get what they needed even if it was from the black market. The poor like Pedro's family had to work hard and sell whatever they could (flags and cigarettes) to make money. The biggest difference was seen at the end when the military was at the shanty town taking people into custody and destroying their belongings. Gonzalo went to check on his friend and when he was about to be taken into custody all it took was for him to tell the soldier to look at his clothes and he was instructed to get out. That is sad that we can be judged by the clothes on our back.

The biggest message for me is that we should treat each other as human beings and like we would want to be treated. Even in our own country we put to much emphasis on money and material possessions.

I personally was wondering why this movie was called Machuca, I felt like Gonzalo was more the center of the story. We met him first and seen more of his life and his families life and how screwed up they all were. It was like a soap opera, we had the slutty older sister and her over bearing boy friend that constantly picked on him. We also met his father, always gone on business and his mother who was having an affair with an older married man. The only constant person in his life that cared about him was his live-in housekeeper. I mentioned earlier that as far as the social issues we see the same thing here. We are definitely divided by classes, we even joke that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. I think the biggest difference is that here in the United States we have agencies in place to assist the poor and or down and out. We have food banks, homeless shelters, churches, welfare, unemployment and others. It is not a perfect system but at least it is there to help. I was disturbed to see the finale scene where the military came in and took the families into custody that lived in the shanty town, killed the young cousin of Pedro for trying to protect her father and then demolishing the shanty town so that it never existed. It is a scary thought to think that one day our government could come into our towns and do that to us just because we did not have money. It is even scarier to think that things like this still occur all over the world today.

This was a good thought provoking movie, still relevant today.

Machuca

Under the Same Moon Questions/Answers

Rosario left Carlito home in Mexico with his granny so that she could go to the United States to try and make a better life for herself and for him. She was a single mother and there was nothing in Mexico for her. She loved Carlito so much that she was willing to risk her life crossing the border illegally, but she loved him to much to risk his.

I think that Rosario made this decision with a very heavy heart. She had nothing to give Carlito and felt like this was the only way that she could provide him with the life that she felt like he deserved. He was her whole life and she wanted him to have everything and she knew that staying in Mexico this would not be possible. I know, being a mother myself, that this was probably the hardest thing that she had ever done, but I also know that I would do anything in my power to give my boys the best life possible.

Carlito faced several problems while his mother was gone with the biggest being the failing health of his granny. He had to grow up very fast. He held a job, went to school, and helped take care of his sick granny. He missed Rosario so much and the only thing that made it tolerable was the weekly phone calls he received from her. Rosario had problems as well. She not only missed Carlito, she was in the United States illegally. She had to work several jobs as a cleaning women to make money and because she was here illegally she was taken advantage of with no recourse. She was even considering marrying a man that she did not love so that she could stay in the United States and finally send for Carlito.

You ask if a mother in the United States would make the same choice and I would have to say no. I really do not think so. We are so fortunate in this country to have many options available to us. First of all there are usually family members ready willing and able to step up and help. There are also many government programs available to aide those who are willing to help themselves. We have educational assistance, housing assistance, food stamps and other programs available. I know that Rosario had a difficult decision and it makes me realize how lucky I am to be an American and live in a country where others would risk their life to live here.

I enjoyed this movie and found it easy to watch even being in Spanish with English subtitles.