Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!
Encyclopedia
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! is a 1990 Spanish
film written and directed by Pedro Almodóvar
, a dark romantic comedy starring Antonio Banderas
and Victoria Abril
. The plot follows a recently released psychiatric patient who kidnaps an actress in order to make her fall in love with him. He believes his destiny is to marry her and father her children.
The film was highly successful with both critics and audiences in Spain
. Its release in the United States
was entangled in controversy. It was instrumental in the implementation by the MPAA of a new rating category, NC-17, for films of an explicit nature that were previously unfairly regarded as pornographic because of the X rating.
Ricky discovers Marina’s whereabouts from a film journal announcement of the start of her next film. He goes to the studio where Marina is in her last day at work filming the Midnight Phantom, a Euro-horror movie about a hideously mutilated, masked muscleman in love with Marina’s character. The film is directed by Máximo Espejo, an old film director who is confined to a wheel chair after a stroke. Máximo is a gentle mentor to Marina and threatens to throw out a journalist who mentions the words "porn" and "junkie" in Marina’s presence. His protection of the actress is not completely innocent since he is sexually attracted to Marina and lusts after her, enjoying what could be his last experience of directing a sexy female lead.
When Ricky comes to the set, he steals a few necessary items including the keys to Marina’s apartment and before long he is an unwelcome presence in her life. Ricky, with a long-haired wig, does a handstand to try to capture her attention. Marina does not remember him and quickly dismisses him.
After filming the last scene, Marina goes home to change for the post-shoot party. Ricky follows her to her apartment. When she answers the door, Ricky forces his way in. He grabs her and head butts her, brutally knocking her to the floor when she screams. He covers her mouth and binds her with rope. Marina wakes with a terrible toothache, which normal painkillers do not counter as she is addicted to stronger drugs. Ricky explains that he has entrapped her so that when she gets to know him better she will fall in love and they will get married and have children. "I'll never love you, ever," says Marina, understandably enraged at being handcuffed, gagged and lashed to the bed. "We'll see," says Ricky, who would do anything to win her heart. Marina is shocked and in pain and eventually persuades Ricky to take her to a doctor who can give her the necessary pain killers. Ricky barely leaves her alone with the doctor and she is unable to communicate her plight. They cannot get the drugs in the pharmacy so Ricky goes off to get them on the black market. However, rather than paying the street price, he attacks the dealer to get the tablets.
During the after filming party Marina’s sister, Lola, who is the assistant director in The Midnight Phantom, steals the show with a musical number. Increasingly worried about her sister’s disappearance, Lola visits Marina's apartment and leaves a note. To avoid being discovered, Ricky moves Marina to her next door neighbor’s apartment. The apartment is empty; the owner left his keys with Lola so she could water his plants while he is away during the summer. In the street again, Ricky is spotted by the dealer who he had attacked and is vigorously beaten and left unconscious. During his absence Marina makes a desperate but somewhat halfhearted attempt to escape from her captivity. However when he returns covered with bruises and cuts, she sees his vulnerability and devotion to her, no matter how misguided. She cares for him, binding his wounds, and is suddenly struck by the realization that she has fallen in love with her captor. They make love at length and Ricky seems to be on the verge of achieving his aim. They decide to take a trip together to his native village. When he is about to leave to steal a car for the trip, Marina, who still considers herself his prisoner, tells him to keep her tied up so that she won't try to escape. However, in Ricky’s absence, Lola reenters the apartment and discovers Marina tied up and rescues her. Marina informs her sister that she is in love with her attacker. Lola is astonished to learn that Marina really no longer wants to be rescued, but supports her sister in her effort to find Ricky. In the end Marina goes after Ricky. She finds him in the ruins of his family house in the country. Ricky, Marina and Lola drive off together into the distance singing, like a true family.
, in a rift that took many years to heal. In any case, at 44 Maura was too old to play the protagonist, a role that demanded a younger actress. Atame was the beginning of a fruitful collaboration with Victoria Abril
. Almodóvar had previously considered her for the role of Cristal, the prostitute neighbor in What Have I Done to Deserve This?
and Candela, the model fleeing a relationship with a terrorist in Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
. Victoria Abril had a cameo role in Law of Desire. She was already a well established actress identified with strong female characters.
The male lead was played by Antonio Banderas in his fifth and most important collaboration with Almodóvar. His role in Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! launched his career in American films. Loles Léon
, a stand up comedian, plays Marina’s sassy sister Lola. She had previously appeared as the meddlesome telephonist in Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
. Francisco Rabal
, one of Spain's foremost actors, took the role of the film director. Almodóvar cast his own mother, Francisca Caballero, as Marina’s mother. Rossy de Palma
, the actress of Picasso
esque appearance discovered by Almodóvar in 1986, plays the small role of the drug dealer.
in early 1990 was inauspicious. The projector broke down and in the following press conference Almodóvar, whose films have not been well understood in Germany , was subjected to heavy questioning about his homosexuality, drug abuse, and the Spanishness of his film.
Released in Spain in January 1990, Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! was an enormous success, becoming the biggest grossing domestic film of its year, reaching an audience of over a million. It had twice the audience of the most critically acclaimed Spanish film of that year, Carlos Saura
’s ¡Ay Carmela!
, a film starring Almodóvar’s former muse Carmen Maura
.
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! was generally well received by the Spanish critics. Lluis Bonet, writing in La Vanguardia, called the film "a terrible tender love story", agreeing with the director that the best scene was that in which Marina, initially held hostage by Ricky against her will, finally asks to be tied up by him so she will not be tempted to flee from the love he has successfully provoked in her. Critic Javier Maqua in Cinco Dias called Marina’s request evidence of "the greatest intensity of love". Rosy de Palma, who plays a drug dealer in the film, explained that the film’s kidnapping was not to be imitated in real life and was only justified by the "exceptional nature of the characters".
British critics took time to warm up to Almodóvar’s films and dismissed Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!. Lawrence O’Toole in Sight and Sound, described it as:" fairly banal, schematic and essentially humorless".
In the United States
the film seemed to offend American puritanism with a lengthy sex scene and by a couple of sequences in which Marina and later her sister Lola sit on the toilet to urinate. Particularly controversial was the shot of Marina in a bath tub pleasuring herself with a scuba diver toy. Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! was entangled in a rating classification battle and was the subject of heated debate. Eventually released unrated, the film was decried by feminists and women's advocacy groups for what they perceived as its sadomasochist undertones and victimization of women. Nevertheless the film grossed $4,087,361 at the North American box office, a respectable amount for a foreign language film.
(MPAA), which determines film ratings in the United States, to give Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! an X rating, which was normally reserved for hard-core pornography
. This marginalized its distribution and reduced its chance of box-office success. The film's distribution company in North America, Miramax, filed a lawsuit against the MPAA over the X rating. When the case came to court in New York
, it gave rise to a general debate on cinema, censorship, and sexuality in the United States.
The attorney for Miramax claimed that the A.A.P. (Average American Parent) was not well served by a system that was lenient on films with hard violence and drug use while being harsh with films depicting sex. Miramax lost its case in court and the film was ultimately released unrated. However, numerous other filmmakers had complained about the X rating given to their films, and in September 1990 the MPAA dropped the X rating and replaced it with the NC-17 rating, with Henry & June
the first film released with the new rating. This was especially helpful to films of an explicit nature that were previously unfairly regarded as pornographic because of the X rating.
Ricky's stated ambition is to be a good husband to Marina and a good father to their children. Indeed, the relationship between Marina and Ricky is meant, ultimately, to be a parody of how such relationships work, as if heterosexuality (and its consequence, marriage) are almost inevitably equivalent in character to the infamous Stockholm syndrome
. The cords that tie us one to another become literal ropey metaphors in the film. It is a tale not of kinky sex, but of a sweeter human bondage, of loose ends tied into lover's knots.
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! follows in the myth of "Beauty and the Beast
" and the notion that the savagery of the Beast is, in the presence of Beauty, tamed by gentler feelings. This has been a recurrent theme in films like King Kong
, Frankenstein
and Tarzan the Ape Man. This theme is also present in Spanish Literature
. In Calderon de la Barca's famous play Life is a dream, the main character, Segismundo, a half-man, half-beast who has been imprisoned for his whole twenty years, once released into the world finds that his violence is tamed by female beauty.
The abduction narrative in Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! has some similarities with the film The Collector (1965) directed by William Wyler
, in which a butterfly specialist abducts a young woman in order to add her to his collection. The Collector was adapted from the eponymous novel written by John Fowles
. In style, theme and plot details, Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! differs greatly from Wyler’s film and the novel that inspired it. Bride kidnapping is also a central plot device in the Hollywood musical Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954).
and horror film
. In spite of some dark elements, It can be described as a romantic comedy, and the director's clearest love story. Almodóvar described the film as a "romantic fairy tale". Ricky, in his violent courtship of Marina follows, in an exaggerated manner, the path of the romantic film genre like those made popular in the late 1950s by Doris Day
with various male film stars: Pillow Talk (1959) with Rock Hudson
; Move Over, Darling
(1963), with James Garner
; and That Touch of Mink
(1962), with Cary Grant
.
The film is also rooted on the tradition of the horror film genre. Marina plays the lead in the horror film Midnight Phantom, in which she defeats the Phantom's attempt to kill her, overcoming him and thus subverting the horror film tradition of a woman as victim in a way that parallels Marina’s relationship with Ricky. While filming the Midnight Phantom, Lola notes that the film they are working on is "more a love story than a horror story", to which Maximo the director replies, "sometimes they’re indistinguishable". Midnight Phantom, is not simply a film within the film: just as the girl in the Midnight Phantom defeats the monster, so ultimately Marina will succeed in taming Ricky. In a way Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! is an extension of the Midnight Phantom and both films mix horror and romance and variant versions of beauty and the beast. Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! also makes reference to two horror films: Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) and Night of the Living Dead
(1968). Máximo Espejo has a poster of Invasion of the Body Snatchers in his editing room and Marina watches Night of the Living Dead while Ricky is away.
in the style of a thriller and is reminiscent of Bernard Herrmann
’s score for Alfred Hitchcock
’s Psycho.
Almodóvar admired Morricone’s soundtracks for westerns, but found the music for Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! conventional and uninspiring, too similar to Morricone's work for the film Frantic
, and used only half of Morricone’s music.
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! prominently features two songs. The film closes with the theme Resistire (I will resist) by Dúo Dinámico
, a Spanish pop duo from the 1960s, suggesting Marina’s happy resistance to Ricky’s unconventional courtship. The after filming party scene breaks the hardship of the kidnapping scene. It presents Lola, Marina’s sister, played by Loles León, singing the bolero Canción del Alma, a song popularized in Latin America
by Alfredo Sadel
.
with English
subtitles. It includes the film’s trailer, but there are no other extras. The region 2 DVD released in the UK includes an interview of Pedro Almodóvar by Antonio Banderas, footage of the premiere in Madrid
, poster and still galleries, and trailers.
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
film written and directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Pedro Almodóvar
Pedro Almodóvar Caballero is a Spanish film director, screenwriter and producer.Almodóvar is arguably the most successful and internationally known Spanish filmmaker of his generation. His films, marked by complex narratives, employ the codes of melodrama and use elements of pop culture, popular...
, a dark romantic comedy starring Antonio Banderas
Antonio Banderas
José Antonio Domínguez Banderas , better known as Antonio Banderas, is a Spanish film actor, film director, film producer and singer...
and Victoria Abril
Victoria Abril
Victoria Abril is a Spanish film actress. She is best known to international audiences for her performance in the movie ¡Átame! by director Pedro Almodóvar....
. The plot follows a recently released psychiatric patient who kidnaps an actress in order to make her fall in love with him. He believes his destiny is to marry her and father her children.
The film was highly successful with both critics and audiences in Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
. Its release in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
was entangled in controversy. It was instrumental in the implementation by the MPAA of a new rating category, NC-17, for films of an explicit nature that were previously unfairly regarded as pornographic because of the X rating.
Plot
Ricky, a twenty-three-year-old psychiatric patient, has been deemed cured and is released from a mental institution. Until then he has been the lover of the woman director of the hospital. An orphan, free, and alone, his goal is to have a normal life with Marina Ozores, an actress, former porn star, and recovering drug addict, whom he once slept with during an escape from the asylum.Ricky discovers Marina’s whereabouts from a film journal announcement of the start of her next film. He goes to the studio where Marina is in her last day at work filming the Midnight Phantom, a Euro-horror movie about a hideously mutilated, masked muscleman in love with Marina’s character. The film is directed by Máximo Espejo, an old film director who is confined to a wheel chair after a stroke. Máximo is a gentle mentor to Marina and threatens to throw out a journalist who mentions the words "porn" and "junkie" in Marina’s presence. His protection of the actress is not completely innocent since he is sexually attracted to Marina and lusts after her, enjoying what could be his last experience of directing a sexy female lead.
When Ricky comes to the set, he steals a few necessary items including the keys to Marina’s apartment and before long he is an unwelcome presence in her life. Ricky, with a long-haired wig, does a handstand to try to capture her attention. Marina does not remember him and quickly dismisses him.
After filming the last scene, Marina goes home to change for the post-shoot party. Ricky follows her to her apartment. When she answers the door, Ricky forces his way in. He grabs her and head butts her, brutally knocking her to the floor when she screams. He covers her mouth and binds her with rope. Marina wakes with a terrible toothache, which normal painkillers do not counter as she is addicted to stronger drugs. Ricky explains that he has entrapped her so that when she gets to know him better she will fall in love and they will get married and have children. "I'll never love you, ever," says Marina, understandably enraged at being handcuffed, gagged and lashed to the bed. "We'll see," says Ricky, who would do anything to win her heart. Marina is shocked and in pain and eventually persuades Ricky to take her to a doctor who can give her the necessary pain killers. Ricky barely leaves her alone with the doctor and she is unable to communicate her plight. They cannot get the drugs in the pharmacy so Ricky goes off to get them on the black market. However, rather than paying the street price, he attacks the dealer to get the tablets.
During the after filming party Marina’s sister, Lola, who is the assistant director in The Midnight Phantom, steals the show with a musical number. Increasingly worried about her sister’s disappearance, Lola visits Marina's apartment and leaves a note. To avoid being discovered, Ricky moves Marina to her next door neighbor’s apartment. The apartment is empty; the owner left his keys with Lola so she could water his plants while he is away during the summer. In the street again, Ricky is spotted by the dealer who he had attacked and is vigorously beaten and left unconscious. During his absence Marina makes a desperate but somewhat halfhearted attempt to escape from her captivity. However when he returns covered with bruises and cuts, she sees his vulnerability and devotion to her, no matter how misguided. She cares for him, binding his wounds, and is suddenly struck by the realization that she has fallen in love with her captor. They make love at length and Ricky seems to be on the verge of achieving his aim. They decide to take a trip together to his native village. When he is about to leave to steal a car for the trip, Marina, who still considers herself his prisoner, tells him to keep her tied up so that she won't try to escape. However, in Ricky’s absence, Lola reenters the apartment and discovers Marina tied up and rescues her. Marina informs her sister that she is in love with her attacker. Lola is astonished to learn that Marina really no longer wants to be rescued, but supports her sister in her effort to find Ricky. In the end Marina goes after Ricky. She finds him in the ruins of his family house in the country. Ricky, Marina and Lola drive off together into the distance singing, like a true family.
Cast
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! marked Almodóvar’s breaking-up with his long time star, Carmen MauraCarmen Maura
Carmen García Maura is a Spanish actress. In a career that has spanned six decades, Maura is best known for her collaborations with noted Spanish film director Pedro Almodóvar.-Early life:...
, in a rift that took many years to heal. In any case, at 44 Maura was too old to play the protagonist, a role that demanded a younger actress. Atame was the beginning of a fruitful collaboration with Victoria Abril
Victoria Abril
Victoria Abril is a Spanish film actress. She is best known to international audiences for her performance in the movie ¡Átame! by director Pedro Almodóvar....
. Almodóvar had previously considered her for the role of Cristal, the prostitute neighbor in What Have I Done to Deserve This?
What Have I Done to Deserve This?
"What Have I Done to Deserve This?" is a song by English synthpop duo Pet Shop Boys, featuring singer Dusty Springfield.When released as a single in late 1987, it peaked at #2 in the UK charts and at #2 on the Billboard Hot 100, becoming the fourth Top Ten hit for Pet Shop Boys as well as the...
and Candela, the model fleeing a relationship with a terrorist in Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown is a 1988 Spanish black comedy film written and directed by Pedro Almodóvar, starring Carmen Maura and Antonio Banderas...
. Victoria Abril had a cameo role in Law of Desire. She was already a well established actress identified with strong female characters.
The male lead was played by Antonio Banderas in his fifth and most important collaboration with Almodóvar. His role in Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! launched his career in American films. Loles Léon
Loles León
María Dolores León Rodríguez is a Spanish actress.She went to Madrid to start a career as an actress. She met Pedro Almodóvar during La Movida Madrileña. He offered her the roles she played in Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios and ¡Átame!...
, a stand up comedian, plays Marina’s sassy sister Lola. She had previously appeared as the meddlesome telephonist in Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown is a 1988 Spanish black comedy film written and directed by Pedro Almodóvar, starring Carmen Maura and Antonio Banderas...
. Francisco Rabal
Francisco Rabal
Francisco Rabal , perhaps better known as Paco Rabal, was a Spanish actor born in Águilas, a small town in the province of Murcia, Spain....
, one of Spain's foremost actors, took the role of the film director. Almodóvar cast his own mother, Francisca Caballero, as Marina’s mother. Rossy de Palma
Rossy de Palma
Rossy de Palma, is a Spanish actress. Described by many as a Picasso come-to-life, Rossy de Palma broke the rules of beauty in 1988 when she starred in Pedro Almodóvar’s Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown and became a model and muse for designers like Jean-Paul Gaultier, Thierry Mugler, and...
, the actress of Picasso
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...
esque appearance discovered by Almodóvar in 1986, plays the small role of the drug dealer.
- Victoria AbrilVictoria AbrilVictoria Abril is a Spanish film actress. She is best known to international audiences for her performance in the movie ¡Átame! by director Pedro Almodóvar....
- Marina - Antonio BanderasAntonio BanderasJosé Antonio Domínguez Banderas , better known as Antonio Banderas, is a Spanish film actor, film director, film producer and singer...
- Ricky - Loles LéonLoles LeónMaría Dolores León Rodríguez is a Spanish actress.She went to Madrid to start a career as an actress. She met Pedro Almodóvar during La Movida Madrileña. He offered her the roles she played in Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios and ¡Átame!...
- Lola - Francisco RabalFrancisco RabalFrancisco Rabal , perhaps better known as Paco Rabal, was a Spanish actor born in Águilas, a small town in the province of Murcia, Spain....
- Máximo Espejo - Julieta SerranoJulieta SerranoJulieta Serrano Romero is a Catalan theatre and cinema actress. Her prolific career began in the 1960s, and she has worked with directors Pedro Almodóvar and Ventura Pons.-Filmography:...
– Alma, Máximo’s wife - Maria BarrancoMaría BarrancoMaría Barranco , born María de los Remedios Barranco García, is a Spanish actress, who has won two Goya Awards for Best Supporting Actress....
– Berta, doctor - Rossy de PalmaRossy de PalmaRossy de Palma, is a Spanish actress. Described by many as a Picasso come-to-life, Rossy de Palma broke the rules of beauty in 1988 when she starred in Pedro Almodóvar’s Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown and became a model and muse for designers like Jean-Paul Gaultier, Thierry Mugler, and...
– drug dealer on scooter - Lola Cardona - Hospital director
- Francisca Caballero – Marina’s mother
Reception
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!, Almodóvar’s eighth film, was completed in late 1989. Its debut at the Berlin Film Festival40th Berlin International Film Festival
The 40th annual Berlin International Film Festival was held from February 9 to 20, 1990.-Jury:* Michael Ballhaus * Margaret Ménégoz * Vadim Abdrashitov* Suzana Amaral* Steven Bach* Roberto Benigni* Lívia Gyarmathy...
in early 1990 was inauspicious. The projector broke down and in the following press conference Almodóvar, whose films have not been well understood in Germany , was subjected to heavy questioning about his homosexuality, drug abuse, and the Spanishness of his film.
Released in Spain in January 1990, Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! was an enormous success, becoming the biggest grossing domestic film of its year, reaching an audience of over a million. It had twice the audience of the most critically acclaimed Spanish film of that year, Carlos Saura
Carlos Saura
Carlos Saura Atarés is a Spanish film director and photographer.-Early life:Born into a family of artists , he developed his artistic sense in childhood as a photography enthusiast.He obtained his directing diploma in Madrid in 1957 at the Institute of Cinema Research and Studies...
’s ¡Ay Carmela!
¡Ay Carmela! (film)
¡Ay Carmela! is a 1990 Spanish film directed by Carlos Saura and based on the eponymous play by José Sanchís Sinisterra. The film stars Carmen Maura, Andrés Pajares, and Gabino Diego as a trio of traveling players performing for the Republic, who inadvertently find themselves on the Nationalist...
, a film starring Almodóvar’s former muse Carmen Maura
Carmen Maura
Carmen García Maura is a Spanish actress. In a career that has spanned six decades, Maura is best known for her collaborations with noted Spanish film director Pedro Almodóvar.-Early life:...
.
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! was generally well received by the Spanish critics. Lluis Bonet, writing in La Vanguardia, called the film "a terrible tender love story", agreeing with the director that the best scene was that in which Marina, initially held hostage by Ricky against her will, finally asks to be tied up by him so she will not be tempted to flee from the love he has successfully provoked in her. Critic Javier Maqua in Cinco Dias called Marina’s request evidence of "the greatest intensity of love". Rosy de Palma, who plays a drug dealer in the film, explained that the film’s kidnapping was not to be imitated in real life and was only justified by the "exceptional nature of the characters".
British critics took time to warm up to Almodóvar’s films and dismissed Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!. Lawrence O’Toole in Sight and Sound, described it as:" fairly banal, schematic and essentially humorless".
In the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
the film seemed to offend American puritanism with a lengthy sex scene and by a couple of sequences in which Marina and later her sister Lola sit on the toilet to urinate. Particularly controversial was the shot of Marina in a bath tub pleasuring herself with a scuba diver toy. Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! was entangled in a rating classification battle and was the subject of heated debate. Eventually released unrated, the film was decried by feminists and women's advocacy groups for what they perceived as its sadomasochist undertones and victimization of women. Nevertheless the film grossed $4,087,361 at the North American box office, a respectable amount for a foreign language film.
Controversy
There was a legal battle over the decision by the Motion Picture Association of AmericaMotion Picture Association of America
The Motion Picture Association of America, Inc. , originally the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America , was founded in 1922 and is designed to advance the business interests of its members...
(MPAA), which determines film ratings in the United States, to give Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! an X rating, which was normally reserved for hard-core pornography
Pornography
Pornography or porn is the explicit portrayal of sexual subject matter for the purposes of sexual arousal and erotic satisfaction.Pornography may use any of a variety of media, ranging from books, magazines, postcards, photos, sculpture, drawing, painting, animation, sound recording, film, video,...
. This marginalized its distribution and reduced its chance of box-office success. The film's distribution company in North America, Miramax, filed a lawsuit against the MPAA over the X rating. When the case came to court in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
, it gave rise to a general debate on cinema, censorship, and sexuality in the United States.
The attorney for Miramax claimed that the A.A.P. (Average American Parent) was not well served by a system that was lenient on films with hard violence and drug use while being harsh with films depicting sex. Miramax lost its case in court and the film was ultimately released unrated. However, numerous other filmmakers had complained about the X rating given to their films, and in September 1990 the MPAA dropped the X rating and replaced it with the NC-17 rating, with Henry & June
Henry & June
Henry & June is a 1990 American film directed by Philip Kaufman and stars Fred Ward, Maria de Medeiros, and Uma Thurman. It is loosely based on the book of the same name by the French author Anaïs Nin, and tells the story of Nin's relationship with Henry Miller and his wife, June.-Plot:The story...
the first film released with the new rating. This was especially helpful to films of an explicit nature that were previously unfairly regarded as pornographic because of the X rating.
Analysis
The Spanish title ¡Átame! literally means "Tie me up!", while the second part of the English title, "Tie Me Down!", is presumably intended to suggest the idea of a lasting relationship. Almodóvar has consistently denied that Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!’s ropes have any links with sadomasochism. There is no erotic charge to the ropes and gags. Almodóvar explained:" Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! is essentially a love story, or rather a story of how someone attempts to construct a love story in the same way as he might study for a degree: by means of effort, will power, and persistence… when you have nothing, like my main character, you have to force everything. Including love. Ricky has only (as the flamenco singers say) the night, the day, and the vitality of an animal."Ricky's stated ambition is to be a good husband to Marina and a good father to their children. Indeed, the relationship between Marina and Ricky is meant, ultimately, to be a parody of how such relationships work, as if heterosexuality (and its consequence, marriage) are almost inevitably equivalent in character to the infamous Stockholm syndrome
Stockholm syndrome
In psychology, Stockholm Syndrome is an apparently paradoxical psychological phenomenon wherein hostages express empathy and have positive feelings towards their captors, sometimes to the point of defending them...
. The cords that tie us one to another become literal ropey metaphors in the film. It is a tale not of kinky sex, but of a sweeter human bondage, of loose ends tied into lover's knots.
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! follows in the myth of "Beauty and the Beast
Beauty and the Beast
Beauty and the Beast is a traditional fairy tale. The first published version of the fairy tale was a rendition by Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve, published in La jeune américaine, et les contes marins in 1740...
" and the notion that the savagery of the Beast is, in the presence of Beauty, tamed by gentler feelings. This has been a recurrent theme in films like King Kong
King Kong (1933 film)
King Kong is a Pre-Code 1933 fantasy monster adventure film co-directed by Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack, and written by Ruth Rose and James Ashmore Creelman after a story by Cooper and Edgar Wallace. The film tells of a gigantic island-dwelling apeman creature called Kong who dies in...
, Frankenstein
Frankenstein (1931 film)
Frankenstein is a 1931 Pre-Code Horror Monster film from Universal Pictures directed by James Whale and adapted from the play by Peggy Webling which in turn is based on the novel of the same name by Mary Shelley. The film stars Colin Clive, Mae Clarke, John Boles and Boris Karloff, and features...
and Tarzan the Ape Man. This theme is also present in Spanish Literature
Spanish literature
Spanish literature generally refers to literature written in the Spanish language within the territory that presently constitutes the state of Spain...
. In Calderon de la Barca's famous play Life is a dream, the main character, Segismundo, a half-man, half-beast who has been imprisoned for his whole twenty years, once released into the world finds that his violence is tamed by female beauty.
The abduction narrative in Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! has some similarities with the film The Collector (1965) directed by William Wyler
William Wyler
William Wyler was a leading American motion picture director, producer, and screenwriter.Notable works included Ben-Hur , The Best Years of Our Lives , and Mrs. Miniver , all of which won Wyler Academy Awards for Best Director, and also won Best Picture...
, in which a butterfly specialist abducts a young woman in order to add her to his collection. The Collector was adapted from the eponymous novel written by John Fowles
John Fowles
John Robert Fowles was an English novelist and essayist. In 2008, The Times newspaper named Fowles among their list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945".-Birth and family:...
. In style, theme and plot details, Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! differs greatly from Wyler’s film and the novel that inspired it. Bride kidnapping is also a central plot device in the Hollywood musical Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954).
Genre
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! combines two different film genres: romantic comedyRomantic Comedy
Romantic Comedy can refer to* Romantic Comedy , a 1979 play written by Bernard Slade* Romantic Comedy , a 1983 film adapted from the play and starring Dudley Moore and Mary Steenburgen...
and horror film
Horror film
Horror films seek to elicit a negative emotional reaction from viewers by playing on the audience's most primal fears. They often feature scenes that startle the viewer through the means of macabre and the supernatural, thus frequently overlapping with the fantasy and science fiction genres...
. In spite of some dark elements, It can be described as a romantic comedy, and the director's clearest love story. Almodóvar described the film as a "romantic fairy tale". Ricky, in his violent courtship of Marina follows, in an exaggerated manner, the path of the romantic film genre like those made popular in the late 1950s by Doris Day
Doris Day
Doris Day is an American actress, singer and, since her retirement from show business, an animal rights activist. With an entertainment career that spanned through almost 50 years, Day started her career as a big band singer in 1939, but only began to be noticed after her first hit recording,...
with various male film stars: Pillow Talk (1959) with Rock Hudson
Rock Hudson
Roy Harold Scherer, Jr., later Roy Harold Fitzgerald , known professionally as Rock Hudson, was an American film and television actor, recognized as a romantic leading man during the 1950s and 1960s, most notably in several romantic comedies with Doris Day.Hudson was voted "Star of the Year",...
; Move Over, Darling
Move Over, Darling
Move Over, Darling is a 1963 remake of the 1940 screwball comedy My Favorite Wife that starred Irene Dunne, Cary Grant and Gail Patrick. The remake stars Doris Day, James Garner, and Polly Bergen.-Plot:...
(1963), with James Garner
James Garner
James Garner is an American film and television actor, one of the first Hollywood actors to excel in both media. He has starred in several television series spanning a career of more than five decades...
; and That Touch of Mink
That Touch of Mink
That Touch of Mink is a 1962 romantic comedy starring Cary Grant and Doris Day. The film co-stars Gig Young, John Astin, Audrey Meadows, and Dick Sargent. In addition, baseball stars Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris, and Yogi Berra make cameo appearances....
(1962), with Cary Grant
Cary Grant
Archibald Alexander Leach , better known by his stage name Cary Grant, was an English actor who later took U.S. citizenship...
.
The film is also rooted on the tradition of the horror film genre. Marina plays the lead in the horror film Midnight Phantom, in which she defeats the Phantom's attempt to kill her, overcoming him and thus subverting the horror film tradition of a woman as victim in a way that parallels Marina’s relationship with Ricky. While filming the Midnight Phantom, Lola notes that the film they are working on is "more a love story than a horror story", to which Maximo the director replies, "sometimes they’re indistinguishable". Midnight Phantom, is not simply a film within the film: just as the girl in the Midnight Phantom defeats the monster, so ultimately Marina will succeed in taming Ricky. In a way Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! is an extension of the Midnight Phantom and both films mix horror and romance and variant versions of beauty and the beast. Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! also makes reference to two horror films: Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) and Night of the Living Dead
Night of the Living Dead
Night of the Living Dead is a 1968 American independent black-and-white zombie film and cult film directed by George A. Romero, starring Duane Jones, Judith O'Dea and Karl Hardman. It premiered on October 1, 1968, and was completed on a USD$114,000 budget. After decades of cinematic re-releases, it...
(1968). Máximo Espejo has a poster of Invasion of the Body Snatchers in his editing room and Marina watches Night of the Living Dead while Ricky is away.
Music
The soundtrack was composed by Ennio MorriconeEnnio Morricone
Ennio Morricone, Grand Officer OMRI, , is an Italian composer and conductor, who wrote music to more than 500 motion pictures and television series, in a career lasting over 50 years. His scores have been included in over 20 award-winning films as well as several symphonic and choral pieces...
in the style of a thriller and is reminiscent of Bernard Herrmann
Bernard Herrmann
Bernard Herrmann was an American composer noted for his work in motion pictures.An Academy Award-winner , Herrmann is particularly known for his collaborations with director Alfred Hitchcock, most famously Psycho, North by Northwest, The Man Who Knew Too Much, and Vertigo...
’s score for Alfred Hitchcock
Alfred Hitchcock
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock, KBE was a British film director and producer. He pioneered many techniques in the suspense and psychological thriller genres. After a successful career in British cinema in both silent films and early talkies, Hitchcock moved to Hollywood...
’s Psycho.
Almodóvar admired Morricone’s soundtracks for westerns, but found the music for Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! conventional and uninspiring, too similar to Morricone's work for the film Frantic
Frantic (film)
Frantic is a 1988 thriller film directed by Roman Polanski and starring Harrison Ford and Emmanuelle Seigner.- Synopsis :Harrison Ford plays Dr. Richard Walker, a surgeon visiting Paris with his wife Sondra for a medical conference. At their hotel, she is unable to unlock her suitcase, and Walker...
, and used only half of Morricone’s music.
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! prominently features two songs. The film closes with the theme Resistire (I will resist) by Dúo Dinámico
Dúo Dinámico
Dúo Dinámico is a Spanish musical duo, which was very popular in Spain and Latin America in the 1960s. It is formed by Manuel de la Calva and Ramón Arcusa, singers, songwriters, record producers and actors. They were the main precursors of pop music in Spain....
, a Spanish pop duo from the 1960s, suggesting Marina’s happy resistance to Ricky’s unconventional courtship. The after filming party scene breaks the hardship of the kidnapping scene. It presents Lola, Marina’s sister, played by Loles León, singing the bolero Canción del Alma, a song popularized in Latin America
Latin America
Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...
by Alfredo Sadel
Alfredo Sadel
Alfredo Sadel was a popular Venezuelan singer and actor. Born Alfredo Sánchez Luna in Caracas, Venezuela, Sadel was affectionately called "The Favorite Tenor of Venezuela" . He adopted his stage name by combining the first syllable of his surname with the last syllable of the surname of his...
.
DVD release
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! was released on DVD in the U.S.A available in SpanishSpanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
with English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
subtitles. It includes the film’s trailer, but there are no other extras. The region 2 DVD released in the UK includes an interview of Pedro Almodóvar by Antonio Banderas, footage of the premiere in Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
, poster and still galleries, and trailers.