The Skin I Live In

Pedro Almodóvar's excursion into hysterical horror is a perverse and unsettling drama about a disturbed surgeon who keeps a woman hostage.

Pedro Almodóvar's excursion into horror is a perverse and unsettling drama full of twists and turns. Antonio Banderas plays a deranged doctor who, while recovering from a history of personal tragedies, entraps a young woman at his medical facility and forces her to undertake a series of experimental skin procedures.

To give The Skin I Live In a full plot synopsis would give the picture of a highly extreme film – taking in incest, rape, and numerous other depravities – but Almodóvar’s classy direction ensures comforting art-house sheen envelops this ostensibly exploitative material. Taking its cue from horror classics like Eyes Without a Face, but with its own entirely original spin, The Skin I Live In is an unsettling yet highly enjoyable slice of high-class Grand Guignol.