PROTO-FEMINIST? 'NUFF SAID...

Variety's web-site reported recently that the writer, Ray Loriga, who co-penned Pedro Almodovar's, Live Flesh, will helm Teresa, a Spanish language project which the filmmakers tout as "a near-psychedelic vision of the raptures and writings of a towering figure, Spain proto-feminist mystic saint Teresa of Avila (1515-82)." Paz Vega (Spanglish) will play Teresa, with Viggo Mortensen projected to flesh out "a cleric." Variety notes...

"Pairing religious subject matter with the sultry Vega, who toplined Julio Medem's sensual Sex and Lucia, and an unconventional style could cause controversy. But Saint Teresa's breathless, stream-of-mysticism prose, reads like a William Burroughs novel, Loriga says. One influence on Teresa, Loriga says, will be David Cronenberg. Above all, Teresa breaks new ground for Spain, which tends to mock its would-be heroes rather than celebrating them.

"I lived in New York for five years. I realized I had a treasure -- Spanish mysticism -- and I wasn't using it. Spanish mysticism is one of the closest approaches to a mystery: man's relation with God," Loriga says. "The time has come for Spaniards to look at their heroes, be proud of them and portray them accurately.""

Not holding my breath on this one.