Released February 20th, 2012
In another installment in the never ending quest of this article to show you a variety of movies , Direct to DVD Dissection brings to you a Spanish sex comedy, named “Red Lips”.
The Story
The story tells of the marriage of Ricardo and Bianca, a couple that have run into some trouble in the romance department after the birth of their two children. They try various new things to try to spice up their love, and end up going to extremes that test their relationship and sanity to their limits.
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The Cast
Jorge Salinas as Ricardo Caballeros, the main character of the movie who has his relationship suffer due to work getting more nightmarish for him. Salinas has experience in various telenovelas and soap operas since the 1990’s.
Silva Navarro as Blanca, the wife of Ricardo that is notable with her “red lips” that led Ricardo to marry her. Along with several parts in soap operas, she was also hostess of a daytime talk show.
Jesus Ochoa as Inspector Gorraez, one of the private detectives hired by the couple to sppy on each other over the possibility of infidelity. A veteran Spanish actor who has crossed over to appear in a few American films like “Man on Fire” and “Quantum of Solace”, along with the upcoming Mel Gibson movie, “Get the Gringo”
The Dissection
Sex comedies come in a number of forms. Some deal with the issue of sex lightly, focusing on descriptions and letting the audience fill in the blanks for themselves. Others go for the explicit nudity and situations that show the audience with no room for changes. A majority mix it up to have both sides evened up, to various success.
Silva Navarro as Blanca,
Red Lips, or “Labios Rojos”, mixes both evenly, showing you the more adult situations while still maintaining a consistent narrative. It never goes too far in showing whatever sexual situation it is depicting, and never loses track of telling the main story it is trying to convey.Not gross out humor or shocking moments to try to get a reaction of you.
I should mention early on, that this movie is not in English. Unlike the last movie reviewed, where it had an English dub, this movie is only in Spanish, with English subtitles. People who have a problem with that will not enjoy this movie, but will miss an interesting story and some pretty good acting, even if you are reading the words off the screen.
The acting of this movie is really good. The lead, Salinas, does a good job with his emotions from moment to moment. His moments in the beginning where he narrates his life work in both the informative and the comedic moments. Along with that, you have the great job done with Navarro’s character of Blanca, caught up with the sitations that occur due to Ricardo’s attempt at something different. The support cast, as well, deliver good performances all throughout the movie, so it never really drags you out of the movie.
Ricardo's mind is a hive of sex and erotica.
As a comedy, it does have some great moments. The intro sequence has some funny moments sure to bring up some “yeah I’ve been there” moments. There’s also these absurd sequences that pop up from time to time, mostly due to the couple’s attempt to spice their love life up or Ricardo thinking of sex and his thoughts getting him excited. It feels absurd, but it also has a sense of reality that makes it all the more interesting. This leads to the more emotional climax and ending, that do pay off all the build up at the end. It’s the perfect example of a narrative reaching each point of a plot and being successful at creating an experience in film.
The movie itself is very good, though it is very bare on extras. It has a couple of trailers for other movies, like:
Love, Letter by Letter: A romance movie that has a single woman needing to decide between three men to be in a relationship.
Saving Private Perez: An action comedy where a group of mercenaries of a drug cartel look to find one of their own, gone missing in the Middle East.
It’s Not You,It’s Me: A romantic comedy, dealing with a man who gets those dreaded five words from his wife and tries to figure out what it means..
From Prada to Nada: A comedy where two rich socialite sister are left with nothing and have to move to East LA. Hilarity Ensues.
Other than that, along with choices of subtitles in English or Spanish, that’s all the DVD has. It’s nearly barebones.
The Verdict
It’s a good movie about sex that should entertain those who can get into it. It avoid the gross out humor and tells a more subdued telling of the relationship of a couple.
Recommended.
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