The Tit and the Moon (1994)

the audience applauded

It is a performances centric movie

n my opinion it was a great movie with some interesting elements, even though having some plot holes and the ending probably was just too messy and crammed together, but still fun to watch and not your casual movie that is similar to all other ones.

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

In Bigas Lunas' final part of his 'Iberian passion trilogy', The Tit & the Moon is both a refreshingly open foray into the fantasies of the female flesh by a young boy, Tete (Biel Duan) but also one with more of a message.In his mind, breast milk means love, as his mother's maternal affections turn totally to his baby brother. When she breast-feeds him and he nuzzles up and is content and happy - and Tete is not, Tete soon decides that what he needs from Life is a breast all to himself.On a silvery, moonlit beach, one night, he prays for such and soon a French couple, a cabaret double act, move in locally and his fascinations and fantasies turn to her. She's (Mathilda May) a knowing and sexy sort of circus dancer - dark and seductive.Whilst the film deals openly and slightly naughtily about sex, desire and womanly seduction, it never feels dirty or squalid, though you wouldn't make it the no. 1 choice to show to your Granny. The humour is earthy and natural, whilst as with the best of European cinema, there's that hint of fantasy and a heightened, fiery emotion.The Tit &... is gentler and less charged than the other two of Luna's trilogy - arguably Jamon Jamon is better, Goldenballs a bit of a bad mistake and this, with its narration by the young boy, it's more akin to Cinema Paradiso. It also has a certain charm about it and in some ways, The Tit &... could be my favourite of Lunas' trilogy.

I recently saw Iñárritu's most recent experiment with cinematic narrative, so I pulled this out. I've been saving it for such an occasion, where I need something from a Spanish mind that is as direct as anything in Hollywood.But it involves two things that Hollywod just cannot seem to do: pre-adolescent wonder about sex, and genuine magical realism. I don't like the term because it is at once too broad (like "surrealism" and "irony") and at the same time usually expressed too simply. Here, the magical worlds we shift in and out of are worlds driven by lactation: one of a boy's fantasy yearning a the second of the physics of what he encounters explained through that world. And there's a third which is shared only between us as adults and the filmmaker.That adult magical world is populated by a French couple: a young dancer played by the desirable Mathilda May and her husband who performs with her. His stage skill is farting, and he bills himself as the man of fire, appearing in fire-painted leathers and with a motorcycle as prop, both for the stage show and the film proper.There's a magical folding of course between the show they put on, the one confabulated by the boy, the one we see in the film, and one managed by the boys' dad. In this latter case, the boy strives to be the top of a penis constructed of men. It begins the film where the boy fails and ends with him fully erect, imagining May's breasts, suckling both her's and his mother's.The French performing farter is loosely based on a real French performer: Joseph Pujol, billed as Le Pétomane. He was the most successful entertainer in late nineteenth century France. This film isn't Spanish at all, instead from a land called Catalonia, a quite unique land that some would say is temporarily occupied by Spain. Its a rather wonderful place which includes Barcelona. The language is more impulsive than French, more languidly sensual than Italian and far more pleasing to the ear than Spanish. It borders on France and has been influenced linguistically at least by that proximity. But just as the Brazilains make fun of the Portuguese, so the Catalons make fun of the French. You have to know that to appreciated the lack of wholeness the French couple has, plus jokes like the French loaf for a penis.Performing: the couple performs on stage; the little boy on top of the human phallus; the older teen on the woman (and singing to her); and certain nipples produce on call.Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

This is a warm, funny film, in much the same vein as the works of Almodovar. Sure it has a 10 year old boy sucking milk from breasts, but the style is so playful that I can't understand at all those readers who found it sick or perverted (but would I be willing to let my 10-year old son play the part? Not so sure!). Spanish cinema is often quite sexual, but in a very open and healthy way that leaves the viewer without any sense of voyeurism or kink. I think that we if we northern European types had the same attitude, we'd be much better off as a result.This liberal attitude is also seen in the hilarious 'Fartman Maurice' character. As his lover says to him: 'Most people are embarrassed about farting. You turn it into an art form.'

I enjoyed a lot watching this movie. It has a great direction, by the already know Bigas Luna, born in Spain. And it is precisely in Spain that the movie takes place, in Cataluña, to be more precise.Luna explores once more the theme of an obcession, in this case the obcession of a young boy for the women's milk. There are some psychological concepts in this story such as the rejection complex that the elder son feels with the birth of his brother. In the movie this is what leads to the obcession of the young boy who suddenly sees all his mother's milk go to the recently born son. So he starts trying to find a breast who is able to feed him. He finds it in a woman recently arrived and from here on the movie is all around this.This movie lives a lot on imagery, more than the story itself, the espectator captures certain moments (unforgettable moments) and certain symbols (the movie deserves a thourough analyses on almost everything that happens because it usually means something...). The surroundings, the landscapes, typical from the region as well as the surreal behaviors of the characters, also symbolic, and the excelent ambiguous soundtrack by Nicola Piovani transport us to another dimension, not parallel to the real world, but which intersects it from times to times... Worth living in that world, worth watching this movie, even though we may eventually and for moments get tired and a bit sick with the excessive obcession, which is perhaps taken beyond the limits...I also enjoyed the performance of the protagonist... 8/10