Frida

Frida (2002) is a biographical film which depicts the professional and private life of the surrealist Mexican painter Frida Kahlo. Is stars Salma Hayek as Kahlo (nominated for an Academy Award) and Alfred Molina as her husband, Diego Rivera.

The movie was adapted by Clancy Sigal, Diane Lake, Gregory Nava, Anna Thomas and Edward Norton (uncredited) from the book Frida: A Biography of Frida Kahlo by Hayden Herrera. It was directed by Julie Taymor. It won Oscars for Best Makeup and Best Original Music Score (receipient: Elliot Goldenthal).

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Tropes used in Frida include:

• Adaptational Attractiveness: A slight case. Kahlo wasn't ugly, but she certainly didn't look like Salma Hayek either. Yay! With a unibrow. Wha?
  • And a thin but prominent mustache. Oh, God...
    • You may hear many jokes about Alfred Molina being to handsome to portray Diego Rivera... half of those are being serious...
• Beauty Inversion: Hayek shaved her upper lip and between her eyebrows to gain the distinctive unibrow and mustache that Kahlo depicts in all her self-portraits.
  • Although it's barely noticeable in some scenes and gone completely in others.
  • False. Shaving does not make your hair grow thicker. The trope stands, but she either used fake hair or let her natural hair grow out.
• Big Ol' Unibrow: Frida made a point of emphasizing her unibrow in all her self-portraits.
  • This was mainly due to Kahlo's horrible self-esteem. In photographs, Kahlo's actually not bad looking, even with the unibrow. But in her self-portraits, Kahlo was notorious for putting emphasis on her uglier features, with her unibrow, mustache, and beauty mark getting special attention.
• The Cameo: Ashley Judd, Antonio Banderas, Geoffrey Rush, Ed Norton, etc. They are all one or two scene wonders.
• Dirty Communist: Heavily averted. The main characters are socialists, as are many of the supporting characters. They're decent people for the most part.
• Fake Nationality: Alfred Molina, a Londoner of Spanish and Italian lineage, plays Mexican Diego Rivera.
  • Geoffrey Rush plays Leon Trotsky.
• Handicapped Badass: Frida, post-accident.
• Imagine Spot: Many scenes are recreations of Frida's paintings.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: The handrail that impaled Kalho in a trolly accident.
• Kavorka Man: Diego is a middle age fat man with a temper, yet he was an intense womanizer. This is apparently Truth in Television.

"You'd never believe it, but he's had half the women in this room."

• Les Yay: This movie focuses on Frida's bi-sexuality in a few scenes, though with the exception of her fling with Josephine Baker, does not explicitly show any of the affairs she had with women. Possibly because her husband Diego did not respond as angrily to them?
• May-December Romance: Frida and Trotsky.
  • Frida and Diego to a lesser extent.
• Mononymous Biopic Title: A first name variation.
• Nay Theist: Inverted with Diego's line: "I don't believe in God but I thank him every day for giving me you."
• Ugly Guy, Hot Wife: Diego (despite his slight Adaptational Attractiveness upgrade) and Frida. . .and the numerous other gorgeous women he's able to hook up with throughout the course of the movie.