A Gun in Each Hand is a Spanish comedy centered on eight men in their 40s, all with identity crises.
When love is a weapon, you need…
Featuring one of the most star-studded (and talented) casts assembled in modern Spanish cinema, including the phenomenal Ricardo Darín, Javier Cámara, Leonor Watling, Luis Tosar, Eduardo Noriega, Candela Peña and Leonardo Sbaraglia, A GUN IN EACH HAND is a witty and scathingly hilarious portrait of forty-something manhood, and its shifting role in contemporary Barcelona.
Chance encounters between old friends, acquaintances, ex-spouses and potential lovers form an engrossing series of six intertwined tales of love, lost and found. Whether it’s Javier Camara’s character’s sorry efforts to win back his ex-wife, Eduardo Noriega’s misguided attempts to woo a co-worker, or Ricardo Darin’s confusion as to why his wife would be having an affair, each meeting starts off with men humbly attempting to secure what they want, and invariably winding up completely bewildered as the women in their lives mercilessly flip the situations around.
Subtitled. Palace Films Collection.
A Gun in Each Hand Movie Review
"This is not an action film and the only thing that gets shot off here are a lot of barbs and back-chat at the expense of blokes, most of whom, on the available evidence, had it coming.
The title derives from a line in the film where a woman, who has just been hit-upon by a married father of one, makes the observation that “guys go around with a gun in each hand”. It is a pun on the idea, which seems to be universal and all-inclusive, that men think with there, um, dicks. But in this movie, all the fellas seem to go off, ah, half-cocked.
Which is to say that this is a movie about masculinity in crisis. It’s largely male cast of thirty and forty somethings are unhappy with their relationships, depressed, and/or divorced. And their mates seem to be in the same position. As such, they don’t have a wife or girlfriend to talk over their issues. Meanwhile, their buddies are next to useless as counsellors. And everyone here seems rather bewildered as to how exactly they ended up in such a lonely place. But director Cesc Gay (In the City) and co-writer Tomas Aragay provide quite a few unflattering hints. Gay has a feel for deadpan comedy and the kind of punchline that lands with a thump hard enough to leave blood in the mouth, like this one: “People only break up because they want to fall in love again.”
Obviously Gay is out to provoke. He’s having a lot of ironic fun here playing with image and expectations. The material might be tough sounding but the film has a consciously artificial look and feel; as if he wants to mythologise these characters and their problems. Everything is lightly stylised – though there is much use of exterior Barcelona locales – and the palette throughout has a warm, comforting feel that promises a happy ending (for somebody). And the all-star cast – many veterans of Almodóvar’s gender wars – adds to the sense that the film is a playful joke.
Gun doesn’t have a plot. Instead it offers a set of powerful narrative and formal gimmicks that map out the male mid-life anxiety through-line. The action is organised as a series of approximately 15-minute scenes, all shot very simply, often in long takes and played out in real time and all with wall-to-wall dialogue. Each of these vignettes are self-contained and each explores a discrete idea: jealously, longing and regret, envy, lust, betrayal.
My favourite of these moments – they’re deeper than ‘sketches’ – is the bit starring Javier Camara and Clara Segura. He’s just returned his son, after a designated visit, to his ex-wife. The divorce was his idea but when he looks at his voluptuous former love, in the apartment they once called home, there’s no mistaking the flood of regret that nearly drowns him. What follows is an agonisingly funny beat where he uses all kinds of pathetic strategies to get her attention; and it’s perfectly clear she moved on a long time ago. What makes the scene live is its lack of cruelty; Segura isn’t oblivious to Camara’s dilemma. It’s just that she’s in no position to provide any kind of help.
Indeed what forms the core of all the scenes is a feeling of helplessness – a kind of male emotional impotency. The guys here don’t seem to have progressed much in their lives, but have become stuck in a sinkhole of self-loathing; self-reliance is a stranger and communication is a fearsome prospect. That’s the key-note of the first vignette – which I also liked a lot. This one plays out entirely in an apartment lobby. It’s based on a chance encounter where two old friends bump into each other and find that, even after much time has passed, it’s hard to talk. It doesn’t help that one of them – Leonardo Sbaraglia – is weeping. (He’s had a hard session with his therapist.) Still, it’s his old pal, played by the brilliant Eduard Fernandez, that, based on appearances, seems to be actually in ‘worse shape’. Divorced, and broke, Fernandez lives with his mother. Sbaraglia, meanwhile, seems to have a rich and full life, and yet, he’s depressed. It’s an awkward comedy of manners with a real sting; when Sbaraglia urges a proper catch up it’s clear that what he most needs is a crutch. His mate wisely keeps his distance… and you wonder where are the women in these men’s lives, in all this drama?
The other scenes are pretty strong; the funniest – and meanest – stars Mamen (Candela Pena), who has a rep as the office ‘bad girl’, and this rumour leads Eduardo Noriega’s passive/aggressive married man into plotting a seduction. But Mamen and her mates set out to teach Noriega a good-natured lesson about gender – and self-respect.
Still, the movie doesn’t play harsh or gloomy and that’s because Gay and co. can see that maybe a sincere personal emotional inventory isn’t implausible for this cast of self-absorbed blokes. Near the end, there’s a party scene. The men are gathered in the kitchen, complaining. The women are, significantly, absent. One of the men observes that when it comes to women, maybe they’re not so nice or clever or considerate, and not one of them rises to defend their gender. They know that there’s wisdom in that utterance. And hope." SBS.com.au