Frida Kahlo is one of the world's most famous Latin American painters, also well known as an amazing female artist. This has not always been the case, because until recently, she was only looked at as the wife of the famous painter Diego Rivera. Now, she has become more internationally recognized and has even had a movie made about her, "Frida." The movie depicts the artist's life, showing her turbulent marriage and the accident that made her become a painter. The main purpose of the film is to expose the suffering in Frida's life and the way it reflects on her paintings. The movie shows many different eras in her life and how each one of them was related to art. Frida's strength comes from her identity as a woman, a Mexican, and an artist.
In the beginning of the movie, there is a scene where 13-year-old Frida is riding in a trolley car, which crashes into a bus. She survives the accident, but is impaled with a metal pole, which leaves her with injuries she must deal with for the rest of her life. As she is recuperating, she stays in bed all day long. Her father brings her a canvas for her to paint so she can entertain herself. This is where her life is an artist begins. Through out her life, she went through several operations because of her accident. She was often unable to move, so she channeled her pain into self-portraits. One of her most famous paintings, "The Bus" is a picture of all the people who were on the bus the day of her accident. She is able to get through many of her struggles through painting because it is something she loved to do and made her an individual.
Frida Kahlo's relationship with Diego Rivera is one of the main themes through out the movie. Although their marriage is full of arguments and infidelities, they continue to stay together. Diego Rivera is one of the reasons why Frida continues to paint, and the movie shows how he is a great influence on her portraits. She paints one of her portraits with her own tears, describing her feelings on all of Rivera's infidelities. When Rivera cheats on her with her own sister, she cuts off all of her hair while looking at the portrait she painted of herself in a man's suit. Finally, she moves out of Diego's home and continues to paint in order to live. Frida's strength allowed her to make this drastic decision in her life, as she was very much in love with Diego. She portrays her strength as a woman also through the flowers she paints because, they symbolize the reproductive organs signifying that new life comes from women
Frida's Mexican culture is another thing that is prevalent in all her paintings and makes her stronger. Frida comes from a very strong and ethical Mexican culture and this helped her deal with many of the troubles that she underwent in her life. Throughout the movie, Frida is very proud of being a Mexican woman and it truly influences her paintings. She is so passionate about her culture that her main goal in her life was to have an exhibition of her art in Mexico. She had traveled to other countries displaying her art, but it is Mexico when she receives all the gratification for her work and this makes her very happy.
This film was set in a time of revolution, Communism, and an era where women were not taken seriously. The movie Frida not only illustrates the difficulty of Frida Kahlo's life; it outlines all of the events and how they reflected on her paintings. This is why Frida is one of histories most important and famous artists. She is constantly proving her strengths through out the movie by all the obstacles she overcomes. She mainly portrays these strengths through her Mexican culture, art, and identity as a woman. Not many women could have the tenacity to deal with the difficulties she experiences in her life.