Critic Reviews

Sexy, peculiar and always entertaining.

The sexy, psycho Mad Love is like a Spanish "The Story of Adele H.," in which a woman loves once and only once, to the point of self-destruction, in the days before Prozac.

Ayala gives Joan a fiery, full-blooded passion and Aranda challenges Pedro Almodovar in the arena of self-destructive love, obsessive passion and sweaty cinematic sex. It's the lustiest costume drama in years.

At 75, Aranda can still make his actors sizzle on the screen as well as he did 10 years ago in "Lovers." The explicitly hot bits here may be few and far between, but what there is of them is choice.

Succeeds as a full-bodied diversion because it takes even its silly elements seriously. If you're in the mood for impressive castles and sumptuous costumes, torch-lit processions and decorative nudity, this is the place to turn.

A bodice-ripper for intellectuals.

It's López de Ayala's show, and she's relentless in her energy and passion.

Star Pilar Lopez de Ayala is such a feisty, striking presence, and the film so conventional in its depiction of a jealous and insatiable love, that it is hard to see Juana as anything other than a typical soap opera heroine.

An often watchable, though goofy and lurid, blast of a costume drama set in the late 15th century.

At heart it's a randy, oversexed soap opera in period garb.