The Skin I Live In (Spain) - Slow Confusing Beginning, Shocking Finale

The Skin I Live In 
Synopsis:
The movie started with Dr. Robert Ledgard (Antonio Banderas) a plastic surgeon and scientist  trying to experiment and discover a perfect skin that is able to withstand burns and insect bite after the death of his late wife in a car accident. He decided to use a girl named Vera Cruz (Elena Anaya) as a guinea pig by placing layers and layers of the skin onto her as well as making the girl face looks like his wife. The movie later panned back and forth to reveal that Dr. Robert Ledgard's wife was indeed involved in a car crash but survive and had burn almost of her body and face. Unable to see her horrible face, she committed suicide in front of her daughter, Norma Ledgard (Blanca Sanchez) who suffers from mild depression. One night in a party, Norma was beaten and raped by Vicente (Jan Cornet) and was discovered by Robert. However, unable to take it, Norma went into severe depression and admitted into mental illness institution. Robert then decided to find Vicente and to take revenge for her daughter's suffering. Robert kidnapped Vicente and held him hostage. There, he perform skin graft experiment on him starting with his private parts from male to female, then his body from male to female and finally his face to become his wife. Lastly, Vicente name is changed to Vera Cruz. One night, Vera plot her long escape by emotionally consoling Robert and takes a gun to shot Robert. After his death, Vera finally went to her/his mom's shop and finally reveal that she is actually Vicente.
Review:
The movie started slow, very slow pace with many current time rewind back to previous time, then forward again to current time. In the beginning it is extremely confusing but after getting the hang of it, it looks a bit interesting especially on the story of Vicente and how he becomes Vera. Overall performance of Antonio Banderas is quite forgettable as a crazy brilliant scientist who created a Frankenstein in Vicente but the performance of Jan Cornet and Elena Anaya who portray as Vicente and Vera Cruz are good and pitiful. Overall, it is a shocking revelation but the movie pace could have been a little bit better.

Verdict:

I give this a 2.5 over 5 star