Sex and Lucia

Lucía y el sexo; erotic drama, Spain, 2001; D: Julio Medem, S: Paz Vega, Tristán Ulloa, Najwa Nimri, Daniel Freire, Elena Anaya

Madrid. Waitress Lucia is losing the will to continue her relationship with depressive writer Lorenzo. When he has an accident and falls in a come, she concludes he is a goner and thus leaves for some island to think about her life in peace. She remembers how she met Lorenzo: she read his novel and started a passionate relationship with him. But a few years ago, he had a one night stand with Elena. She became pregnant and got a daughter, Luna. When he found out, he became depressive. He started an affair with Elaine, Luna's nanny. But Luna was killed by Elaine's dog. Back in present, Lucia meets Elena. Lorenzo wakes up from the coma and maikes up with Lucia and Elena.

When you just read the title, you immediately figure that erotic drama "Sex and Lucia" is, just like most films from the specialist for 'adult romance' Julio Medem, a film that's not quite intended for conservative and morally shy part of the audience, as much as for the ones who live their life in an extroverted way. But due to it's complictaed structure, it's not intended for simple porn lovers either, but for the ambitious viewers who are willing to train their brain cells. Hermetic, chopped up and dreamy story becomes a harmonic whole only towards the end and demands a lot of patience, whereas Medem himself loses the narrative thread here and there. One of the most refreshing aspects of the film is how it shows so much understanding for the love couple: extremely poetic is the sequence where Lorenzo and Elena have intercourse under the water surface, as well as the one where Lucia "starts" a striptease by disrobing her underpants under her dress in some cafe. And in one bizarre sequence Elaine is mastrubrating naked watching a porn on TV - in which her own mother in staring. Interestingly enough, from the moment of the death of the daughter, the story becomes comepltely asexual. Maybe some parts, like the above mentioned, are "rough", yet this is such a complex and dramatic erotic film that it expands the frontiers of its genre. 

Grade:+++