“The face identifies us”

The skin I live in.
An Almodóvar masterpiece.


What does a face have that makes us instantly interpret the whole persona?
If in fact the face does identify us, the question is “identifies us as what?”

If we follow Freud’s line of though on this, strictly speaking, “primary identification is the original and primitive form of emotional attachment to something or someone prior to any relations with other persons or objects.”


If we need the face as a way of identifying ourselves then first let’s understand what is the symbolic meaning of a face.
Throughout human history the face has been hunted, preserved venerated, offered as sacrifice and even eaten.
So, why the face? Well, it contains all essential elements of human awareness, inspiration and expression.
Round in shape, the face carries out transformation and wholeness, it’s a continual transformation into a differentiated state that symbolizes the vessel and substance of life’s eternal re-creations.

There are so many aspects of the movie I would like to point out, but what I will do is concretely talk about Vera, what she represents and her identity in this film.

At first she is portrayed as an extremely beautiful, hysteric, creative, fragile and deeply torn woman.
There are many characteristics in her that accentuates her femininity.


Faceless paintings that induce a bare sensitivity towards the female body without the acknowledgement for the psyche.
Curtains, corridors, windows and clothes are key elements that symbolize a woman, a woman embodying this idealistic figure that must take care of her looks; feel and project beauty with just the texture of the fabric, fetishizing the material to a point that Vera tears the dresses into little pieces and vacuums it, making a statement of “vacuuming her own femininity”, not accepting the new Vera.

At the end of the film where Vera is back to the store, the only way she can be perceived as a woman is by wearing a dress, a dress that she created (identification with herself). Who’s wearing who?

Blood, bees, insects, malaria, orange.

What is Almodovar trying to say with all this imagery?
All are symbols of abjection degrading the image of a woman, being female represents being “cast of”. But there is a peculiar aspect in these four elements.
Joining them is the equation of the universal perception of what is to be a woman.
Honey making is a world creating art, essentially an alchemical “warmth process”.
We can be unnerved by the sight of a single insect, all the more so an infestation producing a heaving sea of movement, trembling antennae and the strong odor of them.

A woman’s flowering is rooted in the soil of her blood, she has been taught to hide the vital energy that our culture has exiled to the menacing realms of the unconscious.
Orange extends into the realm of gold, the incorruptible and everlasting, and into the realm of blood, vigorous, active and mutable.

There is always distance between Robert and Vera, this “creation” that cannot be penetrated or corrupted. A woman is a chameleon, sculpting herself into the environment to survive.

Now, why would Robert change the skin?
Why is this fascination and obsession with this organ?
How can a person change the whole scheme of a body, and actually transform not only the outer part of it, but the inside as well?

“The artificial skin is much tougher than normal skin, and smells differently”
There is something indeed he wants to create, not only a perfect woman, but also a man whom is a perfect woman.
Vera tells Robert that she is “made to order”, bonds perfectly with him. What is the danger on creating a woman who bonds perfectly with a man? She uses this power to destroy him.

“You have to keep the new orifice open and manage, bit by bit, to make it deeper. Think that your life depends on that orifice and you breathe through it”

A misogynistic preconception of the female sex, being always open to the man’s corruption, resisting her own needs and basically surrender by being just a sexual object.

What I find very intriguing is the relation between Vicente and Norma. Vicente is a junky that rapes Norma, Robert instead of spending his energy on her wellbeing captures him and tortures him in order to convert him into his own wife. Robert is in love with Norma’s aggressor. Identification with the aggressor goes both ways, because Robert also infatuates Vera.

Sexual identity is the theme of the film, trying to make a point throughout the whole movie. Vera tells the other doctor “I have always been a woman”. What does this mean?

The last scene made me realize what this was all about; what is the meaning of a powerful woman? What consequences does this entail?

An oedipal tragedy, when Vera shoots Marilia she is covering herself under the bed, a womblike hideaway that protects her and makes her survive, then reaching for her actual mother.

So, what is so fascinating about skin?
“Skin is associated with everything from the wonders of touch to racial profiling.”

Embrace our Madness.


References.

Moon, Beverly. Ed. An Encyclopedia of Archetypal Symbolism. Vol 1. Boston and London, 1991.