Like Frankenstein reassembled as a modern revenge melodrama, this is the first exercise in out-and-out sci-fi/horror from the matchless Pedro Almodóvar.

The result is expectedly baroque. Antonio Banderas – reuniting with Almodóvar for the first time in over two decades – is a plastic surgeon who’s illegally cultured a burn-resistant synthetic skin. A beautiful woman (Elena Anaya), clad invariably in a flesh-coloured body stocking, is his housebound patient. But who is she? And why does she seem like a captive?

Despite once more mining his pet themes of illicit desire and transsexual selfhood, this is perhaps Almodóvar’s most provocative film yet.

[[gerard]] Gerard Elson works at Readings St Kilda.