Change Your Image
salamavanreenen
Reviews
Segunda piel (1999)
A complicated love-triangle
Second skin highlights the plight of Alberto (the perfect example of a family man, outwardly devoted to his wife Elena and their son Adrián) who's struggling to come to terms with his homosexuality due to intense inner conflict. In turn, he cheats on his wife with the handsome surgeon, Diego.
Alberto carries out a double life where he tries to please his wife and gay lover but the implications thereof are cataclysmic. The message is evident of staying true to yourself, how honesty can set you free and the consequences of infidelity – Alberto discovers this too late. He had lost his identity, found himself in a career he was pressurised into pursuing as he tried too hard to please everyone else around him.
I cannot help but pity Alberto, even though he is the cancer in both Elena and Diego's lives. Alberto (as a metaphor) could be present in any of our lives, perhaps not as a homosexual lover/spouse but as that toxic friend, relative or partner that is faulted by human error, the one you keep forgiving and pitying, yet you're fooled by their never ending lies and manipulation.
I enjoyed the movie; however, the ending was off putting. Alberto got off the hook too easily and consequently, Diego and Elena were left to clean up his mess – how will she explain the death of Alberto to Adrián, who will now grow up fatherless.