Desire, Gender, and Identity in Almodóvar's Law of Desire

Introduction: Desire as a Universal and Destructive Force

In La Ley del Deseo (Law of Desire), Pedro Almodóvar explores complex gender and sexuality issues within the broader context of the theme of desire. Pablo Quintero (played by Eusebio Poncela) is an object of desire whose sexual power over Antonio (played by Antonio Banderas) leads to a string of unfortunate events. Antonio is madly in love with Pablo, a Madrileño filmmaker who happens to be also — albeit less madly — in love with the emotionally distant and unavailable Juan. Complicating the love triangle is Tina (played by Carmen Maura), who falls in love with Antonio by the end of the film. However, Tina is transgender and transsexual. Her gender performativity is one of the highlights and defining features of the film, which explores desire explicitly through the lens of homosexuality.

Almodóvar's film also depicts human desire in a more general and universal way. Desire is a force of incredible passion and creativity, motivating the likes of Pablo to titillate audiences with his films. The desire for acceptance, love, and approval are also forces for personal transformation and identity construction. For example, Tina might not have delved as deeply into the murky waters of gender identity had it not been for her keen desire for her father. Desire also has the positive effect of deepening emotional ties and strengthening spiritual bonds between people, if they can elevate desire beyond its destructive capacity.

Almodóvar more adroitly reveals the downside of desire in Law of Desire. Once Antonio can fulfill his emotional need to be with Pablo, he annihilates himself. Desire leads to his suicide and to a murder, as Almodóvar explores the most extreme effects of desire left unchecked. The Law of Desire is a deep paradox of human existence. Desire is the meat of life without which human beings would not exist; yet desire also destroys the hearts, minds, and bodies of human beings. Even if the fulfillment of desire brings rich, passionate pleasure, a frustrated and unfulfilled desire delivers the deepest type of pain imaginable to any human being.

Spanish Culture and the Universal Appeal of the Film

In "Pleasure and the New Spanish Mentality: A Conversation with Pedro Almodóvar," Marsha Kinder calls the emergence of Pedro Almodóvar on the film circuit a watershed moment in European film history because of the uniquely Spanish stamp the director places on his films. Desire is a running theme throughout all of Almodóvar's movies. The filmmaker is so obsessed with the theme of human desire that he named his production company El Deseo. What initially draws attention to Almodóvar films like The Law of Desire is that the themes are at once universal, yet also expressed with particular beauty and realism through the lens of Spanish culture. As Kinder puts it, The Law of Desire is "eminently Spanish" but also "comprehensible to any person," and therefore has universal appeal (33).

The same can be said for the universal themes contained in The Law of Desire related to human sexuality and longing; it matters not that all the main characters are homosexual, bisexual, or transgender. Their desires, faults, and strengths of character are all human. Homosexuality is a detail, a flourish, and even a poignant literary technique that helps the film appeal to a wide and diverse audience. Almodóvar does not limit himself as a director-writer-producer. The filmmaker also imbues many of his productions with deep social and political commentary.

The commentary in The Law of Desire is more about the human condition than about political realities. Almodóvar is not making a direct statement about heteronormativity, although such a statement could be read into the film — especially through the character of Tina. Identity and social-psychological issues such as gender performativity and sexual orientation are almost taken for granted in The Law of Desire, which presumes its audience is mature enough to grasp the film's universal truths without becoming mired in questions of homophobia. As Kinder points out, Almodóvar's film is quintessentially Spanish because of the paradoxical relationship between Spanish romantic ethos and Spanish gender norms and social roles.

Melodrama, Gender Performativity, and Almodóvar as a 'Woman's Director'

As a tragic drama, classic in its depiction of central characters and heroes, The Law of Desire can be accepted as an unabashed melodrama, and Almodóvar does not shy away from that designation. A film about desire cannot exist without melodrama, for desire and melodrama are natural bedfellows. The Law of Desire as a text represents gendered identities in drama; the film itself becomes a performance of gender by virtue of its melodramatic format. As Maddison points out, Almodóvar has been received as a "woman's director," on the presumption that his films do not attract a heterosexual male audience (265).

Calling Almodóvar a "woman's director" presumes a gendered performance among heterosexual males predicated on a lack of appreciation for themes of desire. The heterosexual male may prefer action movies, yet there is plenty of action in The Law of Desire. It can also be assumed that Almodóvar's "female identification" is linked to the filmmaker's exploration of gay themes, gender themes, and the interplay of gender, identity, and sexuality (Maddison 265). Because The Law of Desire is a relationship-driven melodrama, it reads as a "female" or "feminine" text and thus exemplifies gender performativity in a meta-conceptual and paradigmatic way.

Desire is what drives The Law of Desire and makes the film a critical commentary on the universal human experience. Its critique of gender performativity within the dominant culture is deeply ironic. Maddison writes, "it is clearly too gross a simplification to suggest that transgendered identities are appropriating gay performances of gender; nevertheless, this may be a moment for considering the extent to which possibilities for specifically gendered resistance persist in gay culture" (265).