I really don't know where to start with this film, it was very sexual in nature, and when I searched for appropriate pictures to place on my blog, I found that the title means "And your mother, too".
The film itself focuses on two boys at the beginning of adulthood: Julio, from a leftist middle-class family, and Tenoch, whose father is a high-ranking political official. The film opens with scenes of each boy having sex with his girlfriend one last time before the girls leave on a trip to Italy. Without their girlfriends around, the boys quickly become bored.
At a wedding the boys meet Luisa, the wife of Tenoch's cousin Jano. Jano is a writer, and Jano tells Tenoch how to become a writer, it takes years of practice, with real life experiences.
The boys try to impress Luisa with a story about a beach called Heaven's Mouth. To them, it really doesn't exist, but later in the story, they find that it really does exist.
Luisa goes to the doctor, I thought that maybe she found out that she is pregnant, but in the end, it is something totally different, but it does explain her actions throughout the film. Jano goes out of town, and calls Luisa, he is drunk and he confesses to her that he has slept with another woman. Luisa hangs up the phone, she is very sad. Luisa calls Tenoch and asks if they are still going to the beach, Tenoch says yes, and he calls Julio and tells him its time to go. Neither of the boys have a car, so Julio gets the car from his sister who is protesting.
The three of them set off to find this beach, none of them having any idea whatsoever where it is. During their road trip, they have conversations about Julio and Tenoch's sex lives, and Luisa talks about her first love, who was killed in an accident.
They have some trouble with their car, so they spent the night in what seemed to be a hotel. Luisa called Jano and left him a goodbye note on the answering machine. Tenoch needed shampoo so he went to Luisa's room to ask her for some, and they have a sexual encounter. When Tenoch was taking too long, Julio came to see what was going on and saw the two of them. Upset, Julio went out into to swimming pool. Tenoch came out to talk to him, and Julio cofesses that he slept with Tenoch's girlfriend, this causes them to fight.
The next day while driving, Luisa hops into the back seat with Julio. Tenoch is irritated already, he stops the car and gets out. After Julio and Luisa's sexual encounter is over, Luisa talks to Tenoch, she said "This is what you wanted right?" Julio starts driving, and Tenoch confesses to Julio that he too slept with his girlfriend. This made Julio very angry. Luisa was fed up with it, and threatens to leave. She got her bags and started walking. After the boys settled down, they picked Luisa up and drove down a dirt road, finally finding an isolated beach.
They gradually start to relax, and have fun. They meet a family who provided them food and boat rides to other beaches. While in the boat, one of the boys asks what the name of one of the beaches was, and Esteban says "that's Heaven's Mouth". They go to the village. While in the village Luisa makes another final phone call to Jano. The three of them drink heavily, and later they end up in a room. The three of them start to have a very sexual encounter where the two boys are intimate with each other.
The next day, the boys woke up lying next to each other on the bed. Luisa was outside with Ana and the children. Julio states he has to get back to give his sister the care, and Tenoch says he has to get back before his parents start to worry. Luisa decides to stay with Ana and Esteban. The boys go back home, their girlfriends come back from Italy and break up with them. The boys go their seperate ways. About six months later the boys meet for coffee. They do not talk about what happened at the beach, they both looked awkward to talk to each other. Tenoch tells Julio that about a month after they left Luisa, she died. She had cancer all over. She knew about it before she went on the trip, but didn't want to tell anyone.
Both of the boys had new girlfriends. Tenoch was getting ready to go to the University to study Economics, and Juilo was getting ready to go to the community college to study biology. The boys never saw each other again.
The film has periodic narratives explaining the backgrounds of the characters, events and settings, which sometimes draw attention to economic and political issues in Mexico, especially the situation of the poor in rural areas of the country.
This film not only depicts the actions and sexualities of the Spanish culture, but it also depicts our youth today right here in the US. We are use to having much more censorship in the US, so seeing such young people in sexual situations, is a culture shock to some. However, I have never heard the class laugh so much to a film this whole semester as I did to Y tu Mama Tambien!
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Heather, good description of this film. You're right there was a lot of laughter from the class. I do believe it is sad that the youth as portrayed in this film are comparable with the actions of some of our American youth today. It was curious that their parents were only seen two times in the film. Supervision for these teens was very limited. Guess that's what happens when teenagers are left to raise themselves. Thanks for your blog.
ReplyDeleteGreat thoughts, the film is very extreme in some of the scenes. However, is very real at displaying a reality that we cannot hide. There are many children that are abandoned in the poor areas of Mexico City and other Hispanic cities. This has become a big issue since these kids have no supervision and the proliferation of drugs and other deseases keeps increasing among them. on the other hand, the teens in the film did have their parents but they were never there for them. Basically, teenagers need friends and lots of love, in the film they did not get it from their parents. Thus, they found it through their sexual behavior.
ReplyDeleteHeather this is a great description of the movie, I don not even know where to begin in describing the movie I really did not like it very much but it does show how 2 young boys can get into trouble, thanks for such a great post.
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