Kiss of the Spider Woman adaptation still casts a spell

Bill Condon won an Oscar for writing Gods and Monsters, and was also nominated for the screenplay for Chicago — one of the few musicals to ever win best picture.

I doubt he’ll be acknowledged come awards time for his wobbly adaptation and direction of the Kander & Ebb (and Terrence McNally) musical Kiss of the Spider Woman (Rating: ✭✭✭), which — like the 1985 film that won William Hurt an Oscar — was based on the Manuel Puig novel.

I’m lucky enough to have seen the pre-Broadway version of that musical which, speaking of awards, went on to win a bunch of Tonys, including ones for its three stars (Chita Rivera, Canadian Brent Carver and Anthony Crivello) and best musical. I also saw a terrific remount a few years ago, performed in the Don Jail.

Alas, what works well on the stage doesn’t necessarily translate to the big screen. And although filmmaker Jon M. Chu proved you can have characters defy gravity and break out into song, that was Oz and this is Argentina in 1983, at the end of that country’s Dirty War.

The premise is that gay window dresser Molina (charismatic newcomer Tonatiuh), convicted of public indecency (see the musical for the full details), is assigned to share a prison cell with Valentin (Diego Luna), a political dissident and key figure in a revolutionary group.

The prison warden is hoping Molina can extract information from Valentin. But the two prisoners despise each other, Molina’s chatty campiness jarring with Valentin’s gruff, committed rebel.

Gradually, however, the two form a bond, mostly through Molina’s recounting of a movie called Kiss of the Spider Woman, in which his favourite actress, Ingrid Luna (Jennifer Lopez), plays Aurora, a glamorous magazine publisher.

Condon stages these film sequences with Technicolor pizzazz, and he intriguingly inserts both Tonatiuh and Diego Luna into this world, where their interactions — involving betrayal, lies, suppressed lust — mirror what’s happening in their real lives.

The problem is that the prison sequences are so drab, claustrophobic and devoid of conflict they’re a slog to get through. I wish the film’s Valentin had more to say about his political struggles and his reasons for fighting a brutal regime — a theme, by the way, that could have really resonated with the current political moment.

Without that, like Molina, you long to return to the fantasy of the silver screen. At least JLo looks like she’s having fun in her slinky outfits, elaborate wigs and half a dozen outfits and musical numbers.

The film does improve as it progresses and the men’s relationship deepens. Just as Molina gets Valentin to stop generalizing about “you people,” Valentin gets him to stop being self-deprecating and judgemental. Likewise, the actors’ performances take on more layers as the film goes on.

Lopez, meanwhile, dances, sings and (as the titular spider) gives fierce femme fatale in her colourful sequences. Her voice might not have the rich, smoky timbre and brash personality of Rivera’s, but whose could?

Many of the songs have been cut from this version. So if you do like what you hear, I suggest seeking out a revival of the live show. Despite not being first-rate Kander and Ebb (that would be Chicago and Cabaret), Kiss was constructed for the dream-like, illusory and imaginative world of the theatre.

Kiss of the Spider Woman opens in theatres Friday (October 17).