Deep Crimson . Tucson Weekly . 05-18-98

Deep Crimson

DIRECTED BY: Arturo Ripstein

REVIEWED: 05-18-98

From director Arturo Ripstein comes this remake of the '70s cult film The Honeymoon Killers, itself based on a true story. At first, Deep Crimson seems to be a black comedy in the spirit of Pedro Almodovar: Nicolas, a vain, weasely thief who preys on lonely women, is caught by the fat, dangerously manic-depressive Coral, and -- for reasons completely pathetic -- they fall in love. She offers to help him swindle widows, and in a whirlwind series of developments that would do any soap opera (or parody thereof) proud, they plot a victim-by-victim tour through the 1940s Mexican countryside. But the movie turns horribly grim when Coral, overcome by jealousy, keeps killing the women Nicolas is trying to seduce -- over, and over, and over. By film's end, they've even offed someone's daughter. Some may applaud Deep Crimson because it never romanticizes its characters, but so what? We already know how loathsome these people are, and the film's matter-of-fact storytelling offers nothing beyond that. Three cheers for swift Mexican justice, though.

--Woodruff

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