An artist unparalleled. A Marxist impassioned. A woman scorned. The life of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo is a story rife with turmoil of epic proportions. Artists respect her, feminists revere her, and pop culture idolizes her. Joining the legion of admirers is Salma Hayek, the actress whose lifelong obsession with Kahlo served as the catalyst for the making of the newly-released Frida.
Frida opens in 1953 as members of the Kahlo household carry the bed-ridden Kahlo (Hayek) to her first and only exhibition in Mexico. The scene immediately establishes the narrative and visual spirit of the film, drenched in saturated colors and strong light and infused with the passionate intensity and steely determination that the tiny Kahlo radiates as she lies perched atop her deathbed. Despite the illness that wracks her body and the lines of weariness etched upon her face, she is an imposing, regal presence with the kind of knowledge and self-awareness that only comes from a life well lived.
The film then shifts back in time to a 19-year-old Kahlo, a saucy, impetuous spirit clad in a girlish, proper Catholic schoolgirl uniform. She spends her days dressing in men's suits for family portraits, enjoying illicit trysts with her good friend Alex (Diego Luna), reading socialist texts and sassing renowned artist and revolutionary Diego Rivera (Alfred Molina) as he paints murals in her school's auditorium. The idyll of childhood abruptly ends with a bizarre trolley-car accident that leaves Kahlo impaled on a steel pole that pierces her hip and exits through her vagina. During her rehabilitation, she takes to art, drawing butterflies on her cast until it covers her like a brilliantly hued chrysalis. Her parents (Roger Rees and Patricia Reyes Spindola) provide her with a mirrored canopy and a specially designed easel, and she begins to experiment with styles that eventually become her trademarks -- renderings of emotions, self-portraiture. With the help of her parents and her sister Cristina (Mia Maestro), Kahlo undergoes an arduous rehabilitation that partially restores her ability to walk, although she remains in pain for the rest of her life. She learns of the financial troubles that her parents incurred during her recovery, and she decides to make a business of her art. She starts by taking a series of her paintings to Rivera for an uncensored critique.
Rivera finds himself reluctantly drawn to the young painter and takes her under his wing as a fellow artist and revolutionary. He introduces her to his world of riotous intellectual gatherings and artistic and political luminaries, including entrepreneur Nelson Rockefeller (Edward Norton), muralist David Alfaro Siqueiros (Antonio Banderas), photographer Tina Modotti (Ashley Judd) and Leon Trotsky (Geoffrey Rush). The nature of Kahlo and Rivera's relationship changes from platonic to sexual, and they decide to marry, despite the 21-year age difference and his rampant womanizing. When he proposes to her, he warns that he is physiologically incapable of fidelity. She replies that she only cares about his loyalty, not his fidelity. The exchange reflects the nature of their tumultuous marriage. Their affection, passion and respect for each other remain even as he continues his womanizing and she engages in a series of affairs that range from Trotsky to a woman who bears an uncanny resemblance to Josephine Baker.
Frida is a film that aims to be a colorful, larger-than-life tribute to a colorful, larger-than-life woman, and it partially succeeds. The theatrical sensibilities of director Julie Taymor (Titus, The Lion King on Broadway) are evident in the structured yet over-the-top fusion of the narrative and the visual. Her mise-en-scene is complex and overwhelming at times, endless parades of frames drenched in Technicolor hues and filled with elaborate details. She also incorporates a number of unusual visual techniques in order to tell the story, ranging from morbidly fascinating montages of Python-esque cartoons by the brothers Quay to striking transitions in which paintings and the events and people they represent become one and the same. The result is a glorious series of images that serve as the basis for the narrative and illustrate the omnipresence of the art that existed in Kahlo's life, even during the most tragic of times. Ably assisting Taymor are the fluid camera movements of cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto and the tempestuous score of composer Elliot Goldenthal.
If Taymor's direction bolsters the film, the writing cripples it. The screenplay, adapted from Hayden Herrera's biography by four screenwriters (five including an unaccredited revision by Edward Norton), lacks direction and voice, resulting in a perfunctory account of Kahlo's life. The story unravels in a series of Very Important Moments, punctuated with instances of narrative exposition that tell rather than show the underlying subtext. Storylines appear and disappear haphazardly, and the forcefully energetic pacing collapses under the weight of its own ambition, resulting in a sluggish middle act and an ending that lacks impact.
It never hurts to have friends in high places, and the adage proves especially true in Hayek's case. Despite her limited budget, the cast of Frida reads like an excerpt from Who's Who on the A-List of Hollywood. Norton and Banderas give solid if unspectacular turns, while Judd and Rush are languidly glamorous and charismatically genteel, respectively. Rees gives a lovely, understated performance as Kahlo's father, while Maestro is sweetly sympathetic as Kahlo's sister. Adding to the secondary mix is Valeria Golino as Rivera's ex-wife, a woman who first responds virulently to his marriage to Kahlo, only to strike up an odd friendship with the other woman as time passes by.
The heart of the movie lies in the characters of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, and both Hayek and Molina live up to the responsibility. They have exquisite chemistry that adds to the romance of their relationship, and it plays especially well during their quieter, more intimate scenes. Molina is extraordinarily captivating as the booming, bear-like Rivera. He is not a handsome man, but he radiates a powerful aura of charm and energy that creates a potent allure for the opposite sex. He inhabits the character of the morally ambiguous but ideologically pure Rivera completely and commands the attention of those who surround him in the film as well as those who watch him in the audience.
His greatest strength is Hayek's most inhibiting weakness. She is one of Hollywood's most underrated actresses, a performer whose bombshell body belies the talents of a deft, nervy comedienne with intelligence and moxie. Indeed, she shines best in Frida when she has a twinkle in her eye and intentions of mischief up her sleeve. She handles the dramatic aspects of her role with capability and skill, but she never fully inhabits her character the way Molina does. Her passion for Kahlo is admirable and highly evident, but it also serves as a hindrance, as she fails to overcome the separation between actor and character that Molina transcends effortlessly. Still, Hayek's performance is rich in depth and quality, and it's likely that she (and hopefully Molina) will score an Oscar nod come February.
Frida is far from a masterpiece, but it's a compelling work of art with its strong direction, gorgeous visuals and sharp performances. Ironically, its mix of tangible strengths and conceptual weaknesses are perhaps the best tribute to the flawed but powerfully complex spirit that was and will always be Frida Kahlo.
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