Fino

I watched Broken Embraces yesterday and it, like almost all of Pedro Almodovar's movies, was beautifully acted, art directed and written.  Following up on my "city giddiness" a few weeks ago, I smiled when I got that I-wish-I-was-in-Europe feeling during a scene where a scooter zooms by the characters.

One of my dear friends taught me the phrase "fino" when we were in college.  It means fine, but she and her family used it to mean fine as in cashmere, not mohair.  Sterling, not stainless.

She is Cuban and for those of you who know me and Him, you know of His theory as to his origins etc.  Pretty much everything about our friend is fino and I thought fino when the gravely ill father in the movie shuffles out of the hospital entrance and his suit is topstiched.  That's fino.  The worried mother, outside, waiting for the taxi had on a smart shirt/skirt combo that looked like a dress, with sensible heels, PEARLS (for you, CR).  She is so fino!

Penelope Cruz's character, the daughter, races over to the hospital in a fitted Balanciaga-ish grey suit and sleeps in a Hanro tanktop.  So, so, so, so fino!

The film's palette was the beige, red, black and orange of Joan Miro. 

I want to go back to Spain...and this movie is in my all-time top 25.

And this movie, The Baader Meinhof Complex, was stunning and it's in my all-time top 10!

OK, now it's time for "church", which, in my family, means CBS Sunday Morning with Charles Osgood.

Happy Mother's Day.