Como agua para chocolate (Like Water for Chocolate) is a novel written by Laura Esquivel. Published in 1989, it was a long-running best seller in Mexico. (Shaw 37) It remained over a year on the best-seller list of the New York Times and was translated into twenty-nine languages. (Shaw 37) In 1991, Mexican film director Alfonso Arau, also Laura’s husband, decided to adpat the best-seller a film. Then Como agua para chocolate turned out to be the most commercially successful Mexican film of the 1990s. (Shaw 37) However, the high gross of the film did not give a true impression of the state of the Mexican film industry. (Shaw 38) In 1990s, low-quality genre films relying on sex and violence prevailed the national film market in Mexico. (Shaw 38) The film does not reflect a true picture of Mexico either. Following the government’s model of public and private investment, involving Aviasco (a Mexican airline) and the Ministry for Tourism, the film “promotes a conservative, romantic image of rural Mexico that would please the Ministry of Tourism and that belied the reality of mass poverty and ever increasing urbanization.” (Shaw 39) “It is represented as a rural land, which has maintained its culinary and social traditions.” (Shaw 51) The director has commented “the government is very grateful because the film did a great job in promoting tourism and the image of Mexico”. (Shaw 39)
From Novel to Film Como agua para chocolate tells the story around the Garza family during the Mexican Revolution (1910-1917). (Lopez-Rodriguez 62) In the ranch ruled by the family, Mama Elena makes decisions for her three daughters—Gertrudis, Rosaura, and Tita—regardless of their own desires. (Lopez-Rodriguez 62) Both the novel and the film begin with Esperanza’s (Tita’s niece) careful reading of an inherited cookbook from Tita, and it brings back the memory of the Garzas. Tita is born on the dinner table in the kitchen in 1910. She is brought up by the family servant Nacha in the kitchen, where she learns her talent in cooking. As the youngest daughter of the family, Tita is destined to care for Mama Elena till the last second and is prohibited to marriage. However, in a family dinner, young Tita met a young man, Pedro Muzquiz. They soon fell in love with each other and claimed each other as the only love in the life. Pedro proposes to the Garzas, but Mama Elena turns it down. Instead, Pedro marries Tita’s sister Rosaura in order to be near to Tita. While Mama Elena keeps tormenting Tita, Tita confines herself in the kitchen, making all the delicious and creative dishes for the family. Magically, her emotion is blended into every dish she makes and has the ability to influence everyone who tastes the food she makes. In Esquivel’s novel, the story is presented as a cookbook, sequenced with twelve months, with a recipe for each month. The twelve recipes each conclude a chapter, carrying special historical and ethnic implications within the ingredients and the procedures. Although the loving way the camera focuses on food makes clear to the film audience that food is a central character in this story”, the film shifts away from the original structure of the novel and brings the storyline without recipes as separation. (Lopez-Rodriguez 63) Many detailed dishes mentioned in the novel is only given a glimpse in the film, or even omitted, while the other ones are described carefully with the camera language. For instance, the February recipe of capones (capons) and the April recipe of mole de guajolote con almendra y ajonjoli (turkey in almond and sesame sauce) are both cut from the plot, and caldo de colita de res (oxtail soup) and tortas de Navidad (Christmas rolls) are only provided with the simplest description. The several recipes Alfonso Arau focuses on are pastel Chabela de bodas (Chabela wedding cake), codornices en petalos de rosa (quail in rose-petal sauce) and chiles en nogada (chili peppers in walnut sauce). Coincidently, two of these three dishes are specially made for the two weddings in the film, and each brings out a different effect. The emphasis of food in the film and the implications of the recipes will be explored later in the essay. The rest of the story continues in a traditional way. Rosaura soon delivers a baby, and Tita uses her virgin breast milk to feed her. After finding out the vaguely unbroken relationship between Tita and Pedro, Mama Elena sends Pedro and Rosaura away, as well as the baby. Away from Tita, the baby dies, and the reason is believed to be the food. Tita goes insane and hides herself in the dovecote until John Brown, the ranch doctor, picks her up to his house. John takes care of Tita and helps Tita to reconstruct the confidence to face life. Determined to start a new life, Tita accepts John’s proposal. The moment Tita and Pedro reunite on the ranch, both of them know that their passion for each other does not go away. The day John leaves the ranch they have an affair. As a husband, John is always so understanding and tolerant. He forgives the adultery. At the end of the film, John drives car away for business. Pedro takes Tita to the barn house. In the house, the ghost of Nacha appears and lights every candle in the house. In the soft yellow light, Pedro and Tita’s love “finally blossom”. (Hart 172) Metaphorically indicated by the narrator, “all the matches inside Pedro’s body light at the same time”, and the brightness brings him to the eternal of peace. Tita begins to swallow matches, with the memory involving Pedro and her flashing back. She catches fire from the inside meets Pedro in the tunnel to eternity of love. As the script written by the author of the novel, the film is able to retain the original flavors. The story is kept as original, and with the help of visual language, the film can do what the words cannot do. It puts imagination into reality on screen as well as transforming the story into a sumptuous Mexican feast.
Food in Como agua para chocolate As “an important topic in the field of cultural materialism”, food is able to “bring to the forefront those elements of life that were traditionally overlooked because they belonged to the domestic sphere and not to the public, broader, male sphere.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 66) Many directors apply food as a medium to convey the meanings. In Ang Lee’s Eat Drink Man Woman, food is a mirror to Chinese culture and ideology. In Lasse Hallström’s Chocolat, food is a gifted creation of magic potion to cure the lagging and obstinacy of the town residents. In Sandra Nettleback’s Bella Martha, food gives a place for communication and enables people to know each other. In Como agua para chocolate, Alfonso Arau puts tons of emphasis on food. Food plays the central role artistically and commercially. Preparation for food is provided close-up features in the film. The scenes are treated with tenderness and sequential details. Lighting, music and narratives accompanies to strengthen the emotions implicated by the scenes. More than visual enjoyment, the recipes also connect the characters and the storyline. Conclusively, the use of food generally serves functions in four dimensions: as a tag of identity, a language of communication, an expression of creativity and freedom, and an eye into Mexican society in revolutionary and contemporary period. It also offers a space for the story to turn into a magic realistic fairytale.
Language of Expression Food is a metaphor for emotion throughout the film. Gifted as a very sensual woman, Tita is “repeatedly portrayed tasting, seeing, smelling, touching, and hearing. It is only logical that she communicates through an activity that comprises all the senses.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 68) At the time when Tita and Pedro firstly fell in love, Tita described “Pedro’s gaze on her shoulders” as “what raw dough must feel when it comes in contact with hot oil”. “Bubbles break out of her body”. The medium of food solidifies abstract feelings in Tita’s world, and Tita is able to resort to expressing her feelings through the creation of delicacy in the limited area of kitchen. In the kitchen, food is translated into a new language. In the film, Tita’s recipes are always related to whatever is happening to her at the time. One of the scenes is that in which Tita prepares the quails in rose petal sauce. Right after “Pedro has given her the roses to congratulate her on her excellent culinary skills on the anniversary of her first year as the house cook, and she uses them in defiance of her mother in this dish.” The cooking process is split in sequential details—peeling of rose petals, bundling the quails, grinding rose petal sauces, and adding a drop of mysterious seasoning—representing as an expression of her love for Pedro. “This scene is accompanied by lush piano music that highlights the connection between romance and the culinary process.” (Shaw 51) Here, “cooking is Tita’s way of telling him what she cannot vocalize.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 69) Realizing the possible communication between Pedro and her through food, Tita feels “compelled to create more and more recipes that will keep alive the love” that Mama Elena and Rosaura had tried to prohibit. (Lopez-Rodriguez 69) “It is this need to create or re-create delicious dishes that moves Tita to put in writing all the recipes she has received from Nacha; that is how their cookbook is born.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 69)
Territory of Freedom and Creativity We can understand that the kitchen offers Tita an area of “unrestricted freedom” to escape from Mama Elena’s tyranny. (Shaw 50) In the kitchen, Tita is given a free voice to express herself, a territoriality for creativity. (Lopez-Rodriguez 67) Mama Elena tries to control everything of Tita, restricting her from marriage according to the old convention that the youngest daughter should care for mother till death. But her power is limited outside the kitchen. Due to the lack of culinary experience, she never tells Tita what to cook and how to cook, so cooking provides “an outlet for the creativity Mama Elena is always restraining.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 68) So here Tita finds “a means of self-definition and survival”. (Lopez-Rodriguez 66) “The liberation through food and cooking is not limited to Tita alone, but also occurs for the people who eat her meals.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 68) In Tita’s territory, her emotions evoked by personal experience are also transferred to others through food. “She feels and she makes others feel.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 69) When blending the flour and eggs for making Rosaura and Pedro’s wedding cake, Tita unintentionally drops a tear into the ingredient. It turns out that during the wedding reception, whoever has a bite of the cake, is reminded of the sorrow of lost love. In an old Spanish love ballad, a sense of melancholy and frustration from “love of their lives” spreads through every guest and the scene culminates in a collective of vomiting. “Uncontrollable outbursts of pleasure, sadness”, which is usually forbidden in the ranch, is let free with the help of Tita’s food. (Lopez-Rodriguez 68)
Kitchen as An Eye Esquivel has pointed out in an interview: “the kitchen, to me, is the most important part of the house. It is a source of knowledge that generates life and pleasure.” (Hart 173) Como agua para chocolate offers a “feminine kitchen-eye’s view of those turbulent years during Mexican Revolution (1910-1917), which is “at odds with the masculinity rhetoric of the history books with their emphasis on battles and the struggle for civic power.” (Hart 173) “The film, in its content, including modernization, the increase of social inequality, and the growth of feminism. This can be seen in the way that it ignores all of these issues and reinvents the past in such a way as to negate social history. The image of Mexico sold to national and international audiences through the film are filled with nostalgia for a mythical past. In this reinterpretation of the past, gender roles are clearly delineated, class and ethnic tensions are ignored, and nobody goes hungry.” (Shaw 39) The cookbook received by Esperanza is an essential clue in the film. It connects different races and cultures in the film and “symbolizes not only the loving relationship among women but also the preservation of Nahuatl heritage and its mixture with Spanish and Ceole elements”. (Lopez-Rodriguez 70) “Nacha and Chencha, members of ethnic minorities, have been denied by the dominant white upper class the possibility of expressing their knowledge through any medium other than the recipes they cherish. By passing the recipes on to the next generation they are not only able to communicate some practical information but to preserve elements of an indigenous culture that would otherwise be lost.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 69)
Construction of Fairytale Labeled as magical realism, Como agua para chocolate is consisted of numerous fantastic scenes beyond reality and a bunch of fairytale traditions. The main roles in the film have their counterparts, which can be found in traditional fairytales. The romantic heroine Tita is like Cinderella, arduous and kind, while at the meantime suffering the inequality caused by a wicked mother, Mama Elena. Tita is so talented as a maternal role model that she even knows how to deliver the baby. “Bound to the kitchen from the moment of her emblematic birth in this very same room, Tita is treated first by her mother and later by Rosaura as just another servant.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 67) The setting even parallels with the story of Cinderella. John Brown, the fiancé of Tita, is the benevolent, careful and tolerant doctor that can be found in many 18th century fairytales as a positive figure without imperfection. In Como agua para chocolate, his tendance heals Tita’s sorrow for love and his great breath of mind forgives the adultery between Tita and Pedro. Nacha and Chencha are the servants who are satisfied with the status of being ruled and have a loving relationship. Moreover, besides the setting of the roles, the strange alchemical reaction brought by food and the abrupt passion of people all tell the story in the language of fairytale.
Reference: Ching, Eric, Christina Buckley, and Angelica Lozano-Alonso. Reframing Latin America. Austin: University of Texas P, 2007. 286-305. Como Agua Para Chocolate. Dir. Alfonso Arau. Perf. Marco Leonardi, Lumi Cavazos. Videocassette. Buena Vista Home Video, 1992. Esquivel, Laura. Como agua para chocolate: novela de entregas mensuales con recetas, amores y remedios caseros. México, D.F.: Editorial Planeta Mexicana, 1989. Esquivel, Laura. Like Water for Chocolate: a Novel in Monthly Installments, with Recipes, Romances, and Home Remedies. Trans. Carol Christensen and Thomas Christensen. 1st ed. New York: Doubleday, 1992. Halevi-Wise, Yael. "Storytelling in Laura Esquivel's Como agua para chocolate." The Other Mirror: Women's Narrative in Mexico, 1980-1995. Ed. Kristine Ibsen. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood P, 1997. 123-130. Hart, Stephen M. A Companion to Latin American Film. Woodbridge: Tamesis, 2004. 171-178. Lopez-Rodriguez, Miriam. "Cooking Mexicanness: Shaping National Identity in Alfonso Araus Como agua para chocolate." Reel Food. Ed. Anne L. Bower. New York: Routledge, 2004. 61-73. Segovia, Miguel A. "Only Cauldrons Know the Secrets of Their Soups." Velvet Barrios: Popular Culture& Chicana/O Sexualities. Ed. Alicia G. Alba. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. 163-178. Shaw, Deborah. Contemporary Cinema of Latin America: Ten Key Films. New York: Continuum, 2003. 36-51.
这样的人物设置，本身就是一种矛盾和斗争。如果说母亲和附带的大姐是生锈的老传统，二姐就是奔放新生迟早成为钻石的金刚石，那么tita就是最残忍美丽的diamonds and rust.她一生都在矛盾，她和爱和她的母亲，她的欲望和她的伦理道德，她的想做和她的应该做。这样的矛盾，熟悉如同自身分裂出的两个伙伴，亲密无间的共处一具肉体。然后他们终于以他们可以的方式结合，在灵魂与肉体共同走向顶峰的时候，他的灵魂终于到了另一个世界。
Como agua para chocolate (Like Water for Chocolate) is a novel written by Laura Esquivel. Published in 1989, it was a long-running best seller in Mexico. (Shaw 37) It remained over a year on the best-seller list of the New York Times and was translated into twenty-nine languages. (Shaw 37) In 1991, Mexican film director Alfonso Arau, also Laura’s husband, decided to adpat the best-seller a film. Then Como agua para chocolate turned out to be the most commercially successful Mexican film of the 1990s. (Shaw 37) However, the high gross of the film did not give a true impression of the state of the Mexican film industry. (Shaw 38) In 1990s, low-quality genre films relying on sex and violence prevailed the national film market in Mexico. (Shaw 38)
The film does not reflect a true picture of Mexico either. Following the government’s model of public and private investment, involving Aviasco (a Mexican airline) and the Ministry for Tourism, the film “promotes a conservative, romantic image of rural Mexico that would please the Ministry of Tourism and that belied the reality of mass poverty and ever increasing urbanization.” (Shaw 39) “It is represented as a rural land, which has maintained its culinary and social traditions.” (Shaw 51) The director has commented “the government is very grateful because the film did a great job in promoting tourism and the image of Mexico”. (Shaw 39)
From Novel to Film
Como agua para chocolate tells the story around the Garza family during the Mexican Revolution (1910-1917). (Lopez-Rodriguez 62) In the ranch ruled by the family, Mama Elena makes decisions for her three daughters—Gertrudis, Rosaura, and Tita—regardless of their own desires. (Lopez-Rodriguez 62) Both the novel and the film begin with Esperanza’s (Tita’s niece) careful reading of an inherited cookbook from Tita, and it brings back the memory of the Garzas. Tita is born on the dinner table in the kitchen in 1910. She is brought up by the family servant Nacha in the kitchen, where she learns her talent in cooking. As the youngest daughter of the family, Tita is destined to care for Mama Elena till the last second and is prohibited to marriage. However, in a family dinner, young Tita met a young man, Pedro Muzquiz. They soon fell in love with each other and claimed each other as the only love in the life. Pedro proposes to the Garzas, but Mama Elena turns it down. Instead, Pedro marries Tita’s sister Rosaura in order to be near to Tita. While Mama Elena keeps tormenting Tita, Tita confines herself in the kitchen, making all the delicious and creative dishes for the family. Magically, her emotion is blended into every dish she makes and has the ability to influence everyone who tastes the food she makes.
In Esquivel’s novel, the story is presented as a cookbook, sequenced with twelve months, with a recipe for each month. The twelve recipes each conclude a chapter, carrying special historical and ethnic implications within the ingredients and the procedures. Although the loving way the camera focuses on food makes clear to the film audience that food is a central character in this story”, the film shifts away from the original structure of the novel and brings the storyline without recipes as separation. (Lopez-Rodriguez 63) Many detailed dishes mentioned in the novel is only given a glimpse in the film, or even omitted, while the other ones are described carefully with the camera language. For instance, the February recipe of capones (capons) and the April recipe of mole de guajolote con almendra y ajonjoli (turkey in almond and sesame sauce) are both cut from the plot, and caldo de colita de res (oxtail soup) and tortas de Navidad (Christmas rolls) are only provided with the simplest description. The several recipes Alfonso Arau focuses on are pastel Chabela de bodas (Chabela wedding cake), codornices en petalos de rosa (quail in rose-petal sauce) and chiles en nogada (chili peppers in walnut sauce). Coincidently, two of these three dishes are specially made for the two weddings in the film, and each brings out a different effect. The emphasis of food in the film and the implications of the recipes will be explored later in the essay.
The rest of the story continues in a traditional way. Rosaura soon delivers a baby, and Tita uses her virgin breast milk to feed her. After finding out the vaguely unbroken relationship between Tita and Pedro, Mama Elena sends Pedro and Rosaura away, as well as the baby. Away from Tita, the baby dies, and the reason is believed to be the food. Tita goes insane and hides herself in the dovecote until John Brown, the ranch doctor, picks her up to his house. John takes care of Tita and helps Tita to reconstruct the confidence to face life. Determined to start a new life, Tita accepts John’s proposal. The moment Tita and Pedro reunite on the ranch, both of them know that their passion for each other does not go away. The day John leaves the ranch they have an affair. As a husband, John is always so understanding and tolerant. He forgives the adultery. At the end of the film, John drives car away for business. Pedro takes Tita to the barn house. In the house, the ghost of Nacha appears and lights every candle in the house. In the soft yellow light, Pedro and Tita’s love “finally blossom”. (Hart 172) Metaphorically indicated by the narrator, “all the matches inside Pedro’s body light at the same time”, and the brightness brings him to the eternal of peace. Tita begins to swallow matches, with the memory involving Pedro and her flashing back. She catches fire from the inside meets Pedro in the tunnel to eternity of love.
As the script written by the author of the novel, the film is able to retain the original flavors. The story is kept as original, and with the help of visual language, the film can do what the words cannot do. It puts imagination into reality on screen as well as transforming the story into a sumptuous Mexican feast.
Food in Como agua para chocolate
As “an important topic in the field of cultural materialism”, food is able to “bring to the forefront those elements of life that were traditionally overlooked because they belonged to the domestic sphere and not to the public, broader, male sphere.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 66) Many directors apply food as a medium to convey the meanings. In Ang Lee’s Eat Drink Man Woman, food is a mirror to Chinese culture and ideology. In Lasse Hallström’s Chocolat, food is a gifted creation of magic potion to cure the lagging and obstinacy of the town residents. In Sandra Nettleback’s Bella Martha, food gives a place for communication and enables people to know each other.
In Como agua para chocolate, Alfonso Arau puts tons of emphasis on food. Food plays the central role artistically and commercially. Preparation for food is provided close-up features in the film. The scenes are treated with tenderness and sequential details. Lighting, music and narratives accompanies to strengthen the emotions implicated by the scenes. More than visual enjoyment, the recipes also connect the characters and the storyline. Conclusively, the use of food generally serves functions in four dimensions: as a tag of identity, a language of communication, an expression of creativity and freedom, and an eye into Mexican society in revolutionary and contemporary period. It also offers a space for the story to turn into a magic realistic fairytale.
Language of Expression
Food is a metaphor for emotion throughout the film. Gifted as a very sensual woman, Tita is “repeatedly portrayed tasting, seeing, smelling, touching, and hearing. It is only logical that she communicates through an activity that comprises all the senses.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 68) At the time when Tita and Pedro firstly fell in love, Tita described “Pedro’s gaze on her shoulders” as “what raw dough must feel when it comes in contact with hot oil”. “Bubbles break out of her body”. The medium of food solidifies abstract feelings in Tita’s world, and Tita is able to resort to expressing her feelings through the creation of delicacy in the limited area of kitchen. In the kitchen, food is translated into a new language. In the film, Tita’s recipes are always related to whatever is happening to her at the time. One of the scenes is that in which Tita prepares the quails in rose petal sauce. Right after “Pedro has given her the roses to congratulate her on her excellent culinary skills on the anniversary of her first year as the house cook, and she uses them in defiance of her mother in this dish.” The cooking process is split in sequential details—peeling of rose petals, bundling the quails, grinding rose petal sauces, and adding a drop of mysterious seasoning—representing as an expression of her love for Pedro. “This scene is accompanied by lush piano music that highlights the connection between romance and the culinary process.” (Shaw 51) Here, “cooking is Tita’s way of telling him what she cannot vocalize.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 69)
Realizing the possible communication between Pedro and her through food, Tita feels “compelled to create more and more recipes that will keep alive the love” that Mama Elena and Rosaura had tried to prohibit. (Lopez-Rodriguez 69) “It is this need to create or re-create delicious dishes that moves Tita to put in writing all the recipes she has received from Nacha; that is how their cookbook is born.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 69)
Territory of Freedom and Creativity
We can understand that the kitchen offers Tita an area of “unrestricted freedom” to escape from Mama Elena’s tyranny. (Shaw 50) In the kitchen, Tita is given a free voice to express herself, a territoriality for creativity. (Lopez-Rodriguez 67) Mama Elena tries to control everything of Tita, restricting her from marriage according to the old convention that the youngest daughter should care for mother till death. But her power is limited outside the kitchen. Due to the lack of culinary experience, she never tells Tita what to cook and how to cook, so cooking provides “an outlet for the creativity Mama Elena is always restraining.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 68) So here Tita finds “a means of self-definition and survival”. (Lopez-Rodriguez 66)
“The liberation through food and cooking is not limited to Tita alone, but also occurs for the people who eat her meals.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 68) In Tita’s territory, her emotions evoked by personal experience are also transferred to others through food. “She feels and she makes others feel.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 69) When blending the flour and eggs for making Rosaura and Pedro’s wedding cake, Tita unintentionally drops a tear into the ingredient. It turns out that during the wedding reception, whoever has a bite of the cake, is reminded of the sorrow of lost love. In an old Spanish love ballad, a sense of melancholy and frustration from “love of their lives” spreads through every guest and the scene culminates in a collective of vomiting. “Uncontrollable outbursts of pleasure, sadness”, which is usually forbidden in the ranch, is let free with the help of Tita’s food. (Lopez-Rodriguez 68)
Kitchen as An Eye
Esquivel has pointed out in an interview: “the kitchen, to me, is the most important part of the house. It is a source of knowledge that generates life and pleasure.” (Hart 173) Como agua para chocolate offers a “feminine kitchen-eye’s view of those turbulent years during Mexican Revolution (1910-1917), which is “at odds with the masculinity rhetoric of the history books with their emphasis on battles and the struggle for civic power.” (Hart 173) “The film, in its content, including modernization, the increase of social inequality, and the growth of feminism. This can be seen in the way that it ignores all of these issues and reinvents the past in such a way as to negate social history. The image of Mexico sold to national and international audiences through the film are filled with nostalgia for a mythical past. In this reinterpretation of the past, gender roles are clearly delineated, class and ethnic tensions are ignored, and nobody goes hungry.” (Shaw 39)
The cookbook received by Esperanza is an essential clue in the film. It connects different races and cultures in the film and “symbolizes not only the loving relationship among women but also the preservation of Nahuatl heritage and its mixture with Spanish and Ceole elements”. (Lopez-Rodriguez 70)
“Nacha and Chencha, members of ethnic minorities, have been denied by the dominant white upper class the possibility of expressing their knowledge through any medium other than the recipes they cherish. By passing the recipes on to the next generation they are not only able to communicate some practical information but to preserve elements of an indigenous culture that would otherwise be lost.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 69)
Construction of Fairytale
Labeled as magical realism, Como agua para chocolate is consisted of numerous fantastic scenes beyond reality and a bunch of fairytale traditions. The main roles in the film have their counterparts, which can be found in traditional fairytales. The romantic heroine Tita is like Cinderella, arduous and kind, while at the meantime suffering the inequality caused by a wicked mother, Mama Elena. Tita is so talented as a maternal role model that she even knows how to deliver the baby. “Bound to the kitchen from the moment of her emblematic birth in this very same room, Tita is treated first by her mother and later by Rosaura as just another servant.” (Lopez-Rodriguez 67) The setting even parallels with the story of Cinderella. John Brown, the fiancé of Tita, is the benevolent, careful and tolerant doctor that can be found in many 18th century fairytales as a positive figure without imperfection. In Como agua para chocolate, his tendance heals Tita’s sorrow for love and his great breath of mind forgives the adultery between Tita and Pedro. Nacha and Chencha are the servants who are satisfied with the status of being ruled and have a loving relationship.
Moreover, besides the setting of the roles, the strange alchemical reaction brought by food and the abrupt passion of people all tell the story in the language of fairytale.
Reference:
Ching, Eric, Christina Buckley, and Angelica Lozano-Alonso. Reframing Latin America. Austin: University of Texas P, 2007. 286-305.
Como Agua Para Chocolate. Dir. Alfonso Arau. Perf. Marco Leonardi, Lumi Cavazos. Videocassette. Buena Vista Home Video, 1992.
Esquivel, Laura. Como agua para chocolate: novela de entregas mensuales con recetas, amores y remedios caseros. México, D.F.: Editorial Planeta Mexicana, 1989.
Esquivel, Laura. Like Water for Chocolate: a Novel in Monthly Installments, with Recipes, Romances, and Home Remedies. Trans. Carol Christensen and Thomas Christensen. 1st ed. New York: Doubleday, 1992.
Halevi-Wise, Yael. "Storytelling in Laura Esquivel's Como agua para chocolate." The Other Mirror: Women's Narrative in Mexico, 1980-1995. Ed. Kristine Ibsen. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood P, 1997. 123-130.
Hart, Stephen M. A Companion to Latin American Film. Woodbridge: Tamesis, 2004. 171-178.
Lopez-Rodriguez, Miriam. "Cooking Mexicanness: Shaping National Identity in Alfonso Araus Como agua para chocolate." Reel Food. Ed. Anne L. Bower. New York: Routledge, 2004. 61-73.
Segovia, Miguel A. "Only Cauldrons Know the Secrets of Their Soups." Velvet Barrios: Popular Culture& Chicana/O Sexualities. Ed. Alicia G. Alba. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. 163-178.
Shaw, Deborah. Contemporary Cinema of Latin America: Ten Key Films. New York: Continuum, 2003. 36-51.
April 6, 2008
个人爱情、社会风俗以及魔幻，是墨西哥魔化现实主义的主要元素爱情反抗世俗，而魔幻为主人翁的悲剧加上幻想的色彩，淡化了恸哭之情，升华了希冀之意，却并没有对医生John的悲剧手下留情。
在Tina因为Pedro女儿的死亡，陷入疯狂中，John将Tina接到自己美国的家中，给了她无微不至的照顾与关怀，虽然自己和儿子都不喜欢厨娘做的菜，但是都已经习惯了。可是Tina，你不用习惯。在John眼中，Tina是特别的人，需要特别的对待。
John为了重新开启Tina的心灵之门，告诉Tina自己祖母关于爱的阐释，这不仅是本片中最精华的部分，也预言了男女主人翁以后的命运：“我们心里生来就有一盒火柴。我们自己并不能点燃它，我们需要氧气和蜡烛的帮助。......氧气必须来自爱人的呼吸，蜡烛可以是任何东西，一首歌、一句话、一次爱抚、一个声音......任何点燃它的东西。每个人必须找到让他活下去的东西，因为火柴爆发的光亮点燃了我们的灵魂。如果没有什么点燃我们的灵魂，我们的火柴会变得潮湿，我们就再也不能点燃它了。......当然，最重要的是你一次只能点燃一根火柴，因为如果感情剧烈的爆发，会一次都把它们用光，它们会散发出非常强烈的光亮，以至于你会看到一条非常明亮的通道，这就是我们早已忘却的来到世间的通道，这条生之路在召唤我们回去，回到神的身边。”
John不是个严谨乏味的医生，他懂得什么是激烈的爱，他更明白什么是宽容的爱。面对tTina失身给Pedro的事实，John却努力让Tina明白，“你决定谁能成为你生命中的伴侣，如果你说是，我们过几天就结婚；如果你说不，我会第一个恭喜Pedro，还是第一个请求他、要求他给你应得的名分。 "
John温柔、宽宏的爱最终并没有赢过Pedro激烈、自私的爱，最终John心中的火柴再也没被点燃过。John的爱情的悲剧，不是个人魅力的失败，而是魔幻现实主义情节构建造成的失败，因为John的爱，是Tina通过所有考验、升华自己爱情的最重要的一关。只有John的失败，才能完成Tina与Pedr已注定的恋情。
魔幻现实主义，有一种宿命论，所有的一切，从一开始就被预言了、被注定了，人是无法扭转的，个人最终还是败倒在命运的脚下。
影片中有有许多非常后现代的画面
在妹妹Gertrudis裸体在原野中奔跑
Tina只著袜子在鸽子屋中，身体蜷曲，头发披散，周围铺满了羽毛
Tina在John家中，John轻摸Tina的长发
都说爱情是这世界上最美好的东西，但是物极必反，我一直相信爱情转身的背后也有罪恶和恐惧，甚至爱情本身就是一份罪恶。折磨别人也折磨自己，但是你心甘情愿。如果是我，我就说yes i do. 因为没有什么是比爱情本身更美好的。
周一的下午看了2个小时的《浓情巧克力》，这是一个居中的时间段，相比起我钟爱的诸多160min档电影，已属简短，情节依旧简单，总结起来不过是相恋的两个人最初没能在一起但是一直没有放弃相爱这件事情而已。故事的大背景是墨西哥革命动乱时期，整个故事在矛盾与斗争中前进：家族传统和爱情反叛的斗争；欲望和伦理的斗争；甚至是大背景下墨西哥内战时的斗争。
拉美的电影有一个很显著的特点，就是充满魔幻主义色彩。其中墨西哥又有一个特点，就是美食名扬世界。这就是一部将爱情和美食结合起来的电影，运用奇妙的手法运用美食的表现力。不知道是片源的质量问题还是人多的教室充满热气，看这部电影本身就像是在热带的墨西哥赤裸狂奔，微微泛白的过爆镜头里仿佛触碰得到暖热粘稠的热带空气。它告诉我们爱情不需要道理，情欲不需要压抑。
故事从一个乡村家庭的第三个女儿的诞生开始。Tita是被眼泪冲出娘胎的，这也是故事一开始的旁白“当你切洋葱的时候，你就会流泪，但是并不是因为伤心。”Tita在母亲切洋葱的时候突然在子宫里哭泣，眼泪多到母亲直接临盆生产，这种魔幻的出生方式让她一生都伴随着特殊的力量：做菜的力量、爱人的力量，以及抗争的力量。她需要抗争的是她自己的命运，也是造成这种命运的古老传统，以及这个传统具象下来的化身，她母亲。这是一个当丈夫死去就要求Tita作为最小女儿不得出嫁伺候她终身的老修女形象。Tita有两个姐姐，大姐像母亲一样冷漠无趣而恪守陈规，二姐确实墨西哥地区文化的最好代表——奔放大胆而叛逆。这样的极端下，是内心奔放大胆而又处处服从严苛母亲的老三Tita。
这样的人物设置，本身就是一种矛盾和斗争。如果说母亲和附带的大姐是生锈的老传统，二姐就是奔放新生迟早成为钻石的金刚石，那么tita就是最残忍美丽的diamonds and rust.她一生都在矛盾，她和爱和她的母亲，她的欲望和她的伦理道德，她的想做和她的应该做。这样的矛盾，熟悉如同自身分裂出的两个伙伴，亲密无间的共处一具肉体。然后他们终于以他们可以的方式结合，在灵魂与肉体共同走向顶峰的时候，他的灵魂终于到了另一个世界。
我爱极了这部电影，是因为它呈现的真实情欲和爱情的关系，思想和肉体的欢愉，如果你爱过你就会懂，你想把你的所有给一个人。
美食是这部电影最诱人而神奇的部分。
当tita爱的他为了接近她而娶了tita的大姐，不明真相的tita的眼泪滴在蛋糕里，整个宴会的所有的宾客都用味蕾感受到渴望爱而不得的巨大悲伤，一群人趴在河岸集体呕吐的滑稽场面是不是就是墨西哥式的幽默？他告诉tita真相后tita做的鹌鹑沙司铺满玫瑰花瓣，美味到全家吃顿饭吃出高潮，好吧，文艺点的说法是伴随着玫瑰花香的沙司从喉咙进入胃中弥漫开的香气仿佛柔软的唇、坚挺的胸和平滑的肌肤，tita用这样的方式冲撞着他，占有着他，他们在食物的抚慰中相互对视的一眼就是最后升华了的高潮。这不仅是他俩私密的仪式，连二姐都感受得到这种强烈的情欲，以致在饭后的沐浴中让浴室都燃烧了起来，她全裸奔向远处的荒原被寻香而来的牛仔架上马背，开始她自己的浪迹天涯。这才是应该属于二姐的爱情。当他和大姐为了家庭责任而产下一女后，tita却莫名的有了奶水，并且成为这个孩子的唯一指定品牌。拉美人民的魔幻现实主义果然是很理想派，有了孩子tita和他就有了为数不多的正常接触机会，即便这偶尔的接触带来过胸廓清晰的形状，手掌俯在上面的温度，深夜室外墙角下的深吻，终究是抗不过一个封建专制家庭的掌权者一句话。
这个老女人深谙世事，我一直觉得最懂tita的不是奔放积极又勇敢的二姐，她不懂tita的痛和隐忍。但是强势又专断的老女人其实懂，tita在她死后发现她的秘密，“这是一个一生也没有得到过真爱的女人。”但她让自己的痛昨日重现，更何况是在自己的亲生小女儿身上，她用这样的方式告诉世人也告诉自己，节制欲望按传统办事是王道。她的自欺欺人也让她从制造悲剧者的角色而浑身充盈阴影。
一个上半集只出现一次的医生从tita终于不堪忍受老女人的折磨而爆发并神智错乱开始出现在tita的人生中。在tita精神崩溃的一段日子里他一直悉心照料，但是他怎样表现都很容易知道他还是只能不会跳出影视作品男二号定律。因为这是感恩，不是爱情，因为感谢而在一起的报恩行为没有资格成为爱情。 医生说过这样一段话，“我们每个人出生时心里就有一盒火柴，但无法自己点燃，在实验室里，需要氧气和蜡烛助燃。但以人而论，氧气必须来自情人的气息，任何东西都可以成为蜡烛，一曲旋律，一个字眼，一抹爱抚，一个声音……任何东西都行，它扣动一下扳机点燃一根火柴，一根火柴点燃后，我们就会沉浸在这强烈的情感中。人人都得去发掘，什么能扣动心弦使他活着，因为喂哺人灵魂的就是火柴的燃起，如果无法点燃，我们的火柴盒会受潮，连一根也点不着了。但是如果这感情太过强烈，就会一次燃尽所有的火柴，这个时候人就会看到黑暗中的光亮，这是上帝的召唤，这便是应该离去的时候了。”
Tita在已经准备和医生举行婚礼的时候和他完成了两人期待了许多年的事情。这让tita开始动摇，一边是医生的平稳善良，另一边是她从未终止过却始终颠沛流离的真爱。
镜头渐出渐入之后是电冰箱标识的新时代的到来，转眼他和大姐的孩子和医生的孩子长大成人并结为连理，大姐已经疾病而终。这个时候才明白原来tita仍然按照爱情的原则选择了孤身。又一次，tita包含爱意和情欲的美食让所有的宾客食后作鸟兽散分别寻找隐蔽私密场所释放欲望。又一次的墨西哥式魔幻和幽默。
最后一段，整个影片的g点所在，在一间点满蜡烛的房间里只有一张床，上方的小窗户透进来点点星光，和屋内的闪烁的烛光交相辉映，这是一个类似《达芬奇密码》中提到过的仪式一般的场景。在这个场景中，tita和他终于褪去衣物合二为一，不再是暗度陈仓，也不再是妒火所致。他们平静深情的紧紧相拥，互相深入。积攒了20多年的所有感情和爱意终于在这一刻在这个类似祭坛的床上全部燃烧。“如果这感情太过强烈，就会一次燃尽所有的火柴，这个时候人就会看到黑暗中的光亮，这是上帝的召唤，这便是应该离去的时候了。”在这样的旁白中，他走向光亮的容道尽头。tita平静的为两人裹上毯子，吃下一根又一根的火柴，先前隐忍的所有爱恨，自出生以来的所有苦乐都在这一刻化成熊熊烈火。
光亮的容道里，有个人影在等她，执起他的手，回到每个人最初到来人间的地方。
他们是得到了爱情，以看似畸形的方式。尽管个中有猜忌、有乱伦、有伤害，然而爱情始终因它的美好而吸引着心甘情愿的人扑向火海。墨西哥用它奔放而又传统的相互博弈，这是“越过道德的边境，我们走过爱的禁区”，然而这不是“享受幸福的错觉，误解了快乐的意义。”爱情因它自身而美好，不受束于恋人间的相互管制，不屈从与社会传统的禁忌。这是爱情本源的样子。而作为世人，我们只要能占有这本源的一副假面具就已经足矣。
键入《浓情巧克力》，最常搜出的是Johnny depp版本，我虽然爱透了他，但也没法首先置顶他。对此，有人解释的好：好莱坞也有巧克力，但那多是机械化大生产的巧克力，人人平等而享受。而从墨西哥的家庭厨房里飘出的香气或许更加浓郁奇特。
我想看一下南美女人丰饶的裸体在大屏幕上是怎样的奔放和魔幻，可是电脑屏幕还不够大。
如果在银幕上，应该更加魔幻吧。然而这个尺度的电影影院肯定不会放映的，或者删除镜头。
好多年前，也不知道是多少年前，在电视上看过片段，应该只是电影开头的一部分吧。
读洁尘的《小道可观》，看到她说小说《恰似水之于巧克力》，突然想到应该是我看过的电影。
后来在网上查了一下情节，果然有我看到的那一幕，就是这个小说改编的电影。
那个电影，有印象的只是女孩接过男人递过来的玫瑰抱在胸前，裸露的皮肤被划得鲜血淋漓。
我是看到洁尘说“为了接近自己爱的人，佩德罗娶了罗莎乌拉”才想到那个电影的。
因为突然就想到电影中那个男人说，接近自己深爱的女人唯一的办法就是和她的姐姐结婚。
当年玫瑰花划伤胸脯的一幕让我感到非常震撼，不知道当时在日记上是怎么写的了。
时隔多年再看电影，发现只是三条血纹，没有当初的震撼，太过轻描淡写了似的。
对于影片中动人心魄的爱情，也没有当初那么感动了。好似司空见惯。
相对于女人的执著和勇气，男人实在是太过懦弱了。
佩德罗只是对蒂塔一味深情，可是除了深情之外他什么都给不了她了。
他听从岳母的安排，带着妻子远走他乡，留下蒂塔一个人伤心欲绝，每天面对刁钻无情的妈妈。
当再次重逢之后，除了执著不变的爱恋以外，对一切仍旧只有顺从，改变不了命运的安排。
爱情真的是唯一的救赎吗？在失去爱情的日子里，蒂塔只感到无尽的寒冷。
到底什么样的爱情才能给人救赎？是佩德罗带来的激情燃烧，还是约翰传递的安全和平和。
安全和平和点燃不了内心的火苗，但是太过强烈的激情却容易很快燃尽，也容易失火成灾。
我觉得，多年之后重新与这个电影重逢，我的立场已然有所改变。
我已经不只是单纯地被他们历久不衰的爱情所震撼，竟然关照了他们爱情的牺牲品罗莎乌拉。
为了接近蒂塔，佩德罗才娶了她，除了和她生育孩子之外，一丁点的爱情也给不了她。
她的一生就这样被毁掉了，从来没有得到公正的对待，没有品尝过爱情的甜蜜。
这样的损害，纵使别人拥有再怎么伟大的爱情，又有什么资格强加给她呢？
曾经觉得爱情可以是一切的理由，现在却觉得谁也不应该以爱的名义伤害无辜。
很少看到这么精彩的魔幻现实主义色彩的电影。
这是一场名副其实的盛宴，食色性的盛宴，美妙无比，让人回味无穷。
蒂塔的爱情，以食物的形式入侵佩德罗的感官和身体，她的愤怒和悲伤，也以食物来发泄。
赫特鲁迪斯在吃了蒂塔做的玫瑰花瓣鹌鹑之后引发了体内潜藏的情欲，在原野上裸奔。
那样丰饶奔放的肉体真的非常迷人，比起女人们追求的纤细苗条的身体似乎更有健康美感。
几十年之后，一切障碍解除，他们两人再也无须向任何人负责，能够自由地相爱了。
老厨师娜恰的灵魂为他们布置了一个华美的床，他们在那张床上纵情地做爱。
几十年的欲望彻底迸发，内心所有的激情被点燃，佩德罗燃尽生命的火花死去了。
为了和他在一起，蒂塔吃掉了好多火柴头，点燃通往佩德罗的隧道，和他再次相聚。
她一边嚼火柴头，一边闭上眼睛唤起记忆，她和佩德罗一幕幕激动人心的往事再现眼前。
明亮的隧道终于打开，她毫不犹豫地向佩德罗走去，他们将永远不再分离。
佩德罗和蒂塔的肉体迸发出明亮的火花，点燃了整个房子。
房子变成了一座欢快的火山，向四面八方喷发，形成了五彩缤纷的焰火。
焰火整整喷发了一个礼拜。
此时此刻，我又觉得面对这样刻骨铭心的爱情，罗莎乌拉的牺牲实在是太不足道了。
任何事情，任何人，都要像这样的爱情让道，罗莎乌拉的悲哀又算得了什么呢？
谁让她愿意和不爱她的人结婚，况且她也没有爱上他。
我喜欢这样的故事，这样穿越岁月，经久不衰的爱恋才能打动我。
是真的，只有爱人的呼吸才能点燃内心的火苗，让生命焕发光彩，让生活不再空虚。
但愿我们内心永远都有这样的燃烧着的，或者等待点燃的火苗来温暖着自己。
没想到片子竟出乎意料的好看。于我而言，这部片子各个组合元素的丰富和饱满前所未有，就像片中那似乎被红色果汁浸透的傍晚天空，带着不可捉摸却又实实在在的色彩和厚度，而其中掺杂的魔幻更是缤纷得让人倾倒。比方说，女主角 Tita精于厨艺，能把她的情感化到烹调的食物当中，让吃的人也产生类似的情绪反应——悲伤的她为大姐婚礼制作的蛋糕，让所有来宾都悲痛欲绝；心中满着爱的她烤的玫瑰花瓣鹌鹑，使一家人情欲汹涌，尤其严重的是她的二姐，澡房的水浇不熄欲火，她赤身裸体冲了出去，被闻风而来（这可是真正的闻“风”，或者用科学的话说，性外激素，哈哈）的骑兵带走……更妙的是这些魔幻色彩绝非吸引观众目光的噱头。处女哺乳乍一看觉得荒诞，但这为Tita为侄子死去而精神失常预先做了铺垫。医生来接Tita离开农场去他家治疗时，她披着的毯子拖下了马车，无穷无尽地顺路延伸下去，让人想起她绵长的爱情抑或悲哀。伴随Tita死去母亲的魂灵而来的，除了电闪雷鸣，还有和她生前无二的威势和控制力。Tita慢慢鼓起勇气，不止喝退了亡灵，也喝来了侄女自由婚姻的权力。
时间久了，魔幻淡去，人物形象倒是越发饱满分明。Tita是典型的传统女性，擅长烹调，热爱家事，善良驯服，心中满着对恋人的爱，对孩子的爱。这爱最终让她克服了对强权母亲的恐惧，开始主宰自己的生活。让我印象更深的是Tita的母亲。虽然专制强横，牺牲了小女儿的婚姻幸福，她却不失为一位骄傲坚强的女性，独自一人管理农场，带大三个女儿，招婿上门，一切处理得井井有条。她能手劈西瓜，流亡匪徒闯进时毫不犹豫鸣枪示警。她也不是没有脆弱的一面。二女儿跟随叛乱的骑兵而去，她烧掉了女儿的出生证、照片以示决裂，却跌坐在女儿房间里独自哽噎。她死后，Tita发现母亲内心埋藏多年的秘密爱恋，终于让她原谅了母亲，当然不是从女儿的角度，而是同为女人，她太熟悉爱别离的痛苦。Tita的二姐是个特别的存在。Tita若是温润的土地，她就是风，时而迅急时而软和，但总是刮向远方。她或许是作者心目中的理想女性之一，虽然出场时间不多，她不同一般的潇洒气度，对内心的追随，对事态的判断力，对姐妹的关心，在富于表现力的细节中无一遗漏，也深深吸引了我的目光。
我无比热爱片子的叙述角度——Tita的侄孙女Esperanza在厨房中，从Tita遗留的菜谱谈起，引出整个故事。结尾时镜头又回到Esperanza身上，早已去世的Tita和她的侄女出现在她的身侧，微笑对视。这一刻时间压缩，无数回忆奔涌而来，望向Esperanza的目光，是经历了种种爱恨得失之后的平静，是看到深爱的人终获幸福的欣慰，是“新的故事已经开始，我们可以退场”的安心。这个结尾把人的思绪引向时间深处。延绵的血脉，炽热的情感，湮没的过往，那是我们永恒的话题。