Desertman84
Two strangers who have met in one another's dreams come face to face in the real world with disturbing results in this psychological thriller from Mexico directed by Alfonso Pineda Ulloa in the film entitled,Love, Pain and Vice Versa. It features Bárbara Mori and Leonardo Sbaraglia together with Tony Dalton and Irene Azuela.Consuelo is a successful and well-respected architect who found little satisfaction in her love life. While the men she dates cannot satisfy her, each night she dreams of a handsome man who can fulfill all her desires. Meanwhile, Dr. Marquez is a leading heart surgeon who is engaged to marry a beautiful woman, Marcela, but as he sleeps he's visited by terrible visions of a woman who wants to kill him. Consuelo believes she can't go on without finally meeting the literal man of her dream, who she is certain is real, so she devises a plan which she makes herself look as if she's been attacked, and goes to the police and tells them she's been beaten and raped. She gives a careful description of her assailant that closely resembled the man in he dreams, and they soon present her with a suspect who matches the description which happens to be Dr. Marquez. At the same time, when the doctor gets a look at she, he's terrified as he realizes she's a dead ringer for the malevolent woman from his nightmares.In this Mexican film, Alonso Pineda-Ulloa's psychological thriller, one woman's dream turns out to be another man's nightmare.The director relies heavily on surprise twists and turns, and on the chemistry of matching sexpots Barbara Mori and Leonard Sbaraglia to sweep viewers along in a torrent of atmospheric stylings. But the slick pic pulls one too many rabbits out of its hat, disturbing even the voyeuristic dream/waking, his/her symmetry that takes the place of character and plot development. Also,the film's fractured fantasies fail to add up on even a symbolic level, as the pic builds to a dream-doubled climax that has little to do with motivation and everything to do with a notion of heightened cinematic suspense, complete with swelling music and fatefully repeated gestures. But nevertheless,it still manages to entertain the viewer especially those who love psychological dramas similar to Mulholland Drive and Vanilla Sky.
