The Human Voice

A scream echoing on the borders of love, a story of the self that comes together with Pedro Almodóvar’s passionate touch on the stage of loneliness and desire… What we know is just a stage for some of us, and a simple truth for others – here it is, The Human Voice!

With his 2020 short film The Human Voice, Pedro Almodóvar, one of the masters of Spanish cinema, both brings a modern interpretation to a classic work and elevates his cinematic storytelling. Inspired by French writer Jean Cocteau’s play of the same name, this production is Almodóvar’s first film in English. Almodóvar’s films delve deep into the emotional and psychological layers of his female characters, leaving the audience reeling in both a mental and emotional journey. In this film, Tilda Swinton’s captivating performance combines with the director’s visual world to create a minimalist yet intense experience. 

The emotional intensity of an abandoned woman’s last phone call to her ex-lover in a single location. The viewer is at times distanced from her feelings and at other times cannot help but get caught up in her emotional turmoil. Through this emotional intensity, the film ignites* ideas that make us think about love, passion and separation. The woman’s obsessive passion for her ex-boyfriend at one point splits her own self into two: her own existence as a subject on the one hand, the state of relationship that it objectifies, on the other hand.

Reminiscent of Heidegger’s statement “Language is the house of being”, the language used in the movie appears as a tool of illusion, not of truth. Every word of the woman is like a performance to win her lover back. On the other hand, the telephone is no longer just a means of communication; it is a concrete boundary, a tangible barrier between two people. The woman’s voice seems like a bridge trying to reach her lover, but it is also a harsh depiction of this distance – the real pain of being trapped in the symbolic order.  

According to Freud’s theory of mourning, the loss of a loved one is not only the loss of an “other” but also the loss of a part of the self. In this context, the loneliness of the woman in the movie is handled from an existentialist perspective. Inverting Sartre’s “The other is hell”, the woman’s loneliness is, as Cocteau says, “hell without the other”.

The visual world of the film is a nod to Giorgione in Jean Cocteau’s La Voix Humaine and Titian’s ‘Sleeping Venus’. This painting symbolizes both peace and unattainable desire. This image, which coincides with the tragedy of the woman, goes beyond being a simple prop and appears as a tangible piece belonging to the spirit of the story. While Venus remains passively waiting as an idealized object of desire, the female character is clinging to a phone line, depicting the tightness of helplessness. Looking at the larger frame, we observe the inner conflicts of obsessive passions and listen to the silent cries of passion. Like Cocteau, Almodóvar reveals the complexities of love, desire and the search for identity. 

The Human Voice both pays homage to Cocteau’s legacy and showcases Almodóvar’s mastery in exploring the inner world of his female characters. This tragedy on the borders of loneliness and desire rebirths a familiar story with a contemporary aesthetic, as if it were being told for the first time. 

As the impact of the film dissipates like a cloud of smoke in the air, we are left alone in this familiarity and concentrate our feelings in a playlist: