Twice Upon a Yesterday travels back in time
TWICE UPON A YESTERDAY
***
Starring Lena Headey, Douglas Henshall.
Written by Rafa Russo. Directed by Maria Ripoll. (AA) Opens June 11.
BY TOM LYONS
Twice Upon a Yesterday, the debut film by Spanish director Maria Ripoll, tells the story of Victor, an unemployed actor in London who is obsessed with his ex-girlfriend and plans to end it all by wandering into traffic on a rainy night. He is saved by two mysterious Spanish garbage men who grant him a second chance with her by sending him back in time. But as luck, or fate, would have it, as soon as he is back in the past he becomes obsessed with another woman, played by the beautiful Penélope Cruz, the youngest daughter in Belle Epoque.
"The writer [Raffa Russo], he's from Spain. But he lived in London for nine years and he wrote the story when he was living there," explains Ripoll, during her visit to the 1998 Toronto International Film Festival.
"It's his own story. It's very autobiographic, the script. Of course, he never travelled back to the past. But he had to write the script because he regrets so much to have left his girlfriend that he wrote something to repeal his mistake."
Though the writer's experiences are reflected in English-Spanish contrasts, the cultural differences are never exaggerated into a fish-out-of-water farce.
"We were really clear that the magical elements of the movie should be Spanish," says Ripoll. "Like love, the true love is Spanish. Like with Penélope Cruz. And we were really clear that had to be Spanish because there is more room in Spain for this kind of surrealism. And my biggest concern was to get this balance between British humor and Spanish surrealism."
An unexpected means of bridging the two cultures suggested itself when the film crew found itself in the midst of London's Caribbean festival. The script was re-written, and a bit of dope smoking during a reggae concert was added to the usual breakup trauma so Victor would be provided with just enough disorientation for his later entrance into the realm of Dali and Buñuel to seem natural and uncontrived.
"It was fun because I really believe in a mix of cultures, especially in Europe, now that we don't have any more borders," says Ripoll. "I felt totally free shooting in London. And I knew that I could be a little bit off. Because I did not have to portray a five-o'clock-tea look of London. I could portray the carnival scene."
As an intelligent, unsentimental film, Twice Upon a Yesterday has little chance of competing against mainstream fare like Notting Hill. Which makes the decision to drop the original title -- Man With Rain in His Shoes -- all the more unfortunate. Because not only does the new title sound like exactly the sort of generic romantic comedy Ripoll avoided making, it also ignores the symbolism that provides the key to the film she did make.
"The rain. The shoes. The umbrella. The mirrors. And reflections. All these elements," says Ripoll. "Every detail. Every color. Everything is there for a reason."